Bernie Sanders

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I would like to recognize a remarkable Vermonter, Natalee Deaette, who was recently selected as a 2018 Truman scholar. Natalee is one of just 59 outstanding college students from across the country who was honored this year by the Harry S. Truman Scholarship Foundation with this prestigious graduate fellowship for young people who are pursuing careers as public service leaders. Natalee is a member of Boston College's class of 2019, where she studies applied psychology and human development, with a focus on community advocacy and social policy and a minor in managing for social impact. She is involved in BC's Undergraduate Government and Emerging Leader Program, the McGillycuddy Logue Fellows Program, the Montserrat Coalition, Appalachia Volunteers, and the Global Medical Brigades. These are all very notable activities and achievements that demonstrate the depth of Natalee's commitment to her community. What makes Natalee's story all the more impressive is that she broke through significant barriers to get to this place in her life. Natalee is a native of the most rural and economically challenged area of Vermont, where college graduation rates are well below the State and national averages. She is herself a first-generation college student and understands just how difficult it can be to navigate the world of higher education. While in high school, Natalee greatly benefited from participating in Johnson State College's acclaimed Upward Bound program, which helps motivated first-generation high school students prepare for college success. The experience so influenced Natalee that she has worked for the program for the past 3 years. She also credits Upward Bound for inspiring her to pursue a career in public service and addressing educational inequity among disadvantaged youth, particularly those from rural areas. I, like many Vermonters, am enormously proud of all that Natalee has already accomplished, and we look forward to what she will achieve in the future. I join with Natalee's friends and family in congratulating her for being named a Truman scholar and wishing her the best of luck in her future endeavors.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, on April 27, 2018, the Vermont Federal Executive Association recognized several Federal employees in the State of Vermont with Excellence in Government awards. At a time when many Federal agencies are being asked to do more work with fewer resources, it is important to recognize examples of exceptionally good work by members of the Federal workforce. Vermont is fortunate to have close to 5,000 Federal employees working across the State, and I am proud of their commitment to public service. I would like to congratulate the 2018 Excellence in Government award winners who were chosen for this recognition by their peers in VTFEA. The awards are as follows: Supervisor of the Year, Amanda Duquette, Office of Contracting, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; Employee of the Year, Caitlin Moynihan, Homeland Security Investigations, Burlington Field Office, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; Excellence in Mission Support, Staffing Management Team, Northeast Regional Office, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; Excellence in Operational Execution, Targeted Enforcement Unit/Sensor Team, U.S. Border Patrol, Newport Station, U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the FEMA Adjudication Team, Personnel Security, Operations, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; Safety/Valor Award, Laurent Giroux, U.S. Customs and Border Protection and John Zavala, U.S. Border Patrol; and Unit Excellence, Operations Unit Mentoring Team, Law Enforcement Support Center, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Once again, I congratulate these Vermont Federal employees for receiving these awards.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I would like to take a moment to recognize the extraordinary work of Vermont's Meals on Wheels programs. All across the State, hundreds of volunteers regularly deliver freshly cooked nutritious meals to thousands of seniors in their homes, many of whom otherwise might not have enough to eat. These volunteers play a critically important role helping ensure that older Vermonters have access to adequate nutrition. That, in and of itself, is no small matter. These volunteers do much more than just deliver a meal. They also provide invaluable social interaction and companionship for the seniors they visit, which goes a long way to combat the effects of isolation that many older Vermonters face, especially in rural areas. Without this social interaction, seniors are more likely to have feelings of loneliness and depression, which puts them at higher risk for dementia, chronic disease, falls, and hospitalization. The regular visits serve another purpose as well. The volunteers routinely check to make sure that the seniors are safe, secure, and warm. They know each person they visit and recognize immediately if something doesn't seem right. It is no exaggeration to say that they have saved Vermonters' lives by checking when no one answers the door, taking the time to discover that someone had fallen and been injured. Every single Meals on Wheels volunteer has my sincere appreciation for their remarkable work. I would also like to recognize the caring and dedicated professionals that run Vermont's Meals on Wheel these programs, from the chefs who prepare the nutritious meals that the volunteers deliver, to the program staff who ensure that everything runs smoothly. Together, these agencies served more than 1 million meals in Vermont last year alone. They form an indispensable component of our social safety net for older Vermonters. Last month was ``March for Meals,'' when Meals on Wheels programs across the country expand their outreach to draw attention to the growing need for the services these agencies provide. I am enormously pleased that many of my Vermont staff rode along with Meals on Wheels volunteers across the State to see the wonderful work they are doing.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I would like to take a moment to recognize the extraordinary work of Julie Nadeau of Waterford, VT. Julie, a mother of five, has been a volunteer for the St. Johnsbury Meals on Wheels program for the past 4 years, delivering meals to area seniors 3 days a week. Julie brings freshly cooked nutritious meals to 42 seniors in their homes, many of whom otherwise might not have enough to eat. She plays a critically important role helping ensure that older Vermonters in the most rural and lowest income region of our State have access to adequate nutrition. That, in and of itself, is no small matter. Julie understands that she is doing much more than just delivering a meal. She is also providing invaluable social interaction and companionship for the seniors she visits. She takes pride in finding time to have meaningful conversations with each senior, which goes a long way to combat the effects of isolation that many older Vermonters face, especially in rural areas. The regular visits serve another purpose as well. Julie routinely checks to make sure that the seniors are safe, secure, and warm. She knows each person she visits and recognizes immediately if something doesn't seem right. It is no exaggeration to say that Julie has saved Vermonters' lives by checking when no one answers the door, taking the time to discover that someone had fallen and been injured. Julie Nadeau has my sincere appreciation for her remarkable work. Of course, Julie is but one of many regular volunteers who give their time to ensure that seniors receive nutritious meals and conversation. Each and every one of those volunteers deserves to be recognized for their efforts. Moreover, the St. Johnsbury Meals on Wheels program is run by caring and dedicated professionals. Chefs Ashley Coburn and Amy Garfield prepare the nutritious meals that Julie delivers, and program director Diane Coburn ensures that everything runs smoothly, as the organization provides close to 36,000 meals this year, for a mere $6.64 per meal. The St. Johnsbury Meals on Wheels program is but one of many such programs that are doing incredible work all across the State. Together, those programs served more than 1 million meals in Vermont last year alone. This is an indispensable component of our social safety net for older Vermonters. Last month was ``March for Meals,'' when Meals on Wheels programs across the country expand their outreach to draw attention to the growing need for the services these agencies provide. I am enormously pleased that many of my Vermont staff rode along with Meals on Wheels volunteers across the State, including with Julie Nadeau, to see the wonderful work they are doing.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. In other words, no matter what one's view may be about the wisdom of the war, to vote to table is to abdicate our constitutional responsibility?

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I speak only for myself on this issue and will tell you why I am so motivated about this resolution. If we think back on the modern history of our country and if we think of the two most significant foreign policy decisions--the war in Vietnam and the war in Iraq and the unbelievable unintended consequences that those two destructive wars had--what we conclude is that in both of those wars--one under a Democratic President and one under a Republican President--the Congress abdicated its responsibility. It did not ask the right questions. In both instances, we got into those terrible wars based on lies. The Johnson administration lied as to why we should get involved in the war in Vietnam, and the Bush administration lied as to why we should get involved in the war in Iraq. It just seems to me that if nothing else, based on those two examples of what the war in Vietnam did and what the war in Iraq did, Congress has to take a deep breath and understand that the people who wrote the Constitution were not fools when they said it must be the elected people who are closest to the constituents who have to debate these issues and who know that decisions being made will result in the loss of lives of the people in their own States, and we have abdicated that responsibility. No one can predict whether the decisions made by Congress are going to be good decisions with regard to war and peace, whether we are going to do better than Presidents did. I don't know. At the very least, we have to accept our responsibility and not simply take the word of Presidents who in the two most recent, significant wars have lied to the American people. Once again, I know there may be differences of opinion regarding the wisdom of involvement by the United States in the war in Yemen. If you think it is a good idea, vote against our resolution. There should be no difference of opinion about accepting our responsibility under the Constitution and voting on whether it is a good idea. I yield to the Senator from Utah.

Mr. SANDERS. All right. Let me just concur with Senator Murphy. If you think it is a good idea for the United States to be involved in the war in Yemen with Saudi Arabia, you can vote against our resolution. Yet I can think of no reason at all as to why any Member of Congress would vote to table this resolution and prevent that discussion, and I would hope that we would have strong support against any motion to table and allow that debate to go forward. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. Let me concur with what Senator Lee just said. There may be disagreements about the wisdom of being allied with Saudi Arabia on the war in Yemen. There will be honest disagreements about that. But there cannot be and there must not be an abdication of constitutional responsibility in terms of making that decision. If you think that U.S. participation in the war in Yemen is a good idea, you can vote against our resolution. If you agree with us that it is a bad idea, support our resolution. But simply to abdicate your responsibility on this issue would be absolutely irresponsible. I hope we have virtually unanimous support in voting against the effort to table. Then let's get into the debate about the wisdom of the war and vote it up or down. Needless to say, I hope the Members support our resolution. Let's at least have that vote and not abdicate our responsibility.

Mr. SANDERS. Let me ask my friend from Connecticut the same question I asked Senator Lee, and that is whether he agrees with me that we are really dealing with two separate issues here. The first issue is really, in a sense, a no-brainer. It is whether the Congress or, in this case, the Senate of the United States accepts its constitutional responsibility on issues of war. We are now engaged in a war in Yemen with Saudi Arabia. The Constitution is very clear in article I, section 8 that it is the Congress that determines whether this country goes to war. I believe what will happen in a few hours is that a motion to table will come up. Would you agree with me that it would be an act of cowardice, in a sense, an irresponsibility, an abdication of congressional responsibility, for somebody to vote to table that resolution?

Mr. SANDERS. Thank you, Mr. President. Article I, section 8 of the Constitution states in no uncertain terms that ``Congress shall have power to . . . declare war.'' Let me repeat it. Article I, section 8 of the Constitution states it is Congress that has the power to declare war. The Founding Fathers gave the power to authorize military conflicts to Congress, the branch most accountable--not to the President but to Congress--and that is the issue we are going to be debating today. For far too long, Congress, under Democratic and Republican administrations, has abdicated its constitutional role in authorizing war. The time is long overdue for Congress to reassert that constitutional authority, and that is what today is about. That is why I and 14 cosponsors of this resolution--Senators Lee, Murphy, Warren, Booker, Durbin, Leahy, Markey, Feinstein, Wyden, Merkley, Blumenthal, Gillibrand, Schatz, and Baldwin--that is what we are doing with S.J. Res. 54. What we are saying is, if Congress wants to go to war in Yemen or anyplace else, vote to go to war. That is your constitutional responsibility. Stop abdicating that responsibility to a President, whether it is a Republican President or, as in the past, Democratic Presidents. I expect that colleagues today will be arguing about what the word ``hostilities'' means within the context of the 1973 War Powers Resolution. What does the word ``hostilities'' mean? Some will argue that American troops are not out there shooting and getting shot at, not exchanging gunfire with their enemies, and that we are not really engaged in the horrifically destructive Saudi-led war in Yemen. That is what some will argue on the floor today--that we are really not engaged in hostilities; we are not exchanging fire. Well, please tell that to the people of Yemen whose homes and lives are being destroyed by weapons marked ``Made in the USA'' and dropped by planes being refueled by the U.S. military on targets chosen with U.S. assistance. Only in the narrowest, most legalistic terms can anyone argue that the United States is not actively involved in hostilities alongside Saudi Arabia in Yemen. Let me take a minute to tell my colleagues what is happening in Yemen right now because a lot of people don't know. It is not something that is on the front pages of the newspapers or covered terribly much on television. Right now, in a very poor nation of 27 million people--that is the nation of Yemen--in November of last year, the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator told us that Yemen was on the brink of ``the largest famine the world has seen for many decades.'' That is from the United Nations. So far, in this country of 27 million people--this very poor country--over 10,000 civilians have been killed and 40,000 civilians have been wounded. Over 3 million people in Yemen, in a nation of 27 million, have been displaced--driven from their homes. Fifteen million people lack access to clean water and sanitation because water treatment plants have been destroyed. More than 20 million people in Yemen--over two-thirds of the population of that country--need some kind of humanitarian support, with nearly 10 million in acute need of assistance. More than 1 million suspected cholera cases have been reported, representing potentially the worst cholera outbreak in world history. That is what is going on in Yemen today as a result of the Saudi-led war there. Here is the bottom line: If the President of the United States or Members of Congress believe that support for this war is in the U.S. interests--and I think some do--if you think that the United States right now, for our own interests, should be involved in the civil war in Yemen, being led by Saudi Arabia, then Members of the U.S. Senate should have the courage to vote for U.S. participation in that war. It is nothing more complicated than that. If you want to come to the floor of the Senate and make the case as to why you think it is good public policy for us to be involved in the civil war in Yemen, come to the floor and oppose our resolution, but what I hope very much that we will not see today is the tabling of this motion and the refusal by Members of the Senate to vote up or down as to whether we wish to continue aiding Saudi Arabia in this humanitarian disaster. If you believe, as I do, that we should not get sucked into this civil war, which has already caused so much human suffering, please vote against tabling the motion to discharge and vote with us on final passage. If you believe the United States should continue to assist Saudi Arabia in this war, I urge you to have the courage to tell your constituents that is your decision and why you have made that decision when you vote against final passage. In other words, if you support the war, have the courage to vote for it; if you don't, support the resolution Senator Lee, Senator Murphy, and I have introduced. Let me give my colleagues at least two reasons why Congress must reassert its constitutional authority over the issue of war and why we cannot continue to abdicate that responsibility to the President, and those have everything to do with the two most significant foreign policy disasters in the modern history of the United States--the war in Iraq and the war in Vietnam. In both of these cases, Congress sat back and failed to ask the hard questions as two administrations--one Republican, one Democratic--led us into conflicts with disastrous consequences. Interestingly, today is a historically significant day for us to debate this resolution. Fifteen years ago today, on March 20, 2003, the war in Iraq began, and the bombs started falling in Baghdad--15 years ago today. I was one of those who opposed the Iraq war in the beginning, and today it is now broadly acknowledged that the war--that war--was a foreign policy blunder of enormous magnitude. That war created a cascade of instability around the region that we are still dealing with today in Syria and elsewhere and will be for many years to come. Indeed, had it not been for the war in Iraq, ISIS would almost certainly not exist. That war deepened hostilities between Sunni and Shia communities in Iraq and elsewhere. It exacerbated a regional conflict for power between Saudi Arabia and Iran and their proxies in places like Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, and it undermined American diplomatic efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The devastation experienced by Iraq's civilians was enormous. A recent academic study by U.S., Canadian, and Iraqi researchers found that over 400,000 Iraqi civilians--nearly half a million people--were killed directly or indirectly as a consequence of that war. That war led to the displacement of nearly 5 million people, both inside and outside Iraq, putting great stress on the ability of surrounding countries to deal with these refugee flows. We have also seen this more recently in Europe as the large numbers of people fleeing the Syrian war have generated a backlash in European countries, giving rise to anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant sentiments. The war in Iraq led to the deaths--to the deaths--of some 4,400 American troops and the wounding, physical and emotional, of tens of thousands of others, not to mention the pain inflicted on family members. By the way, that war in Iraq cost us trillions of dollars-- money that could have been spent on healthcare, education, infrastructure, and environmental protection. The Iraq war, like so many other military conflicts, had unintended consequences. It ended up making us less safe, not more safe. It must be said that the Bush administration and the President lied when he told the American people: ``[Saddam's] regime is seeking a nuclear bomb, and with fissile material could build one within a year.'' That was not true. Vice President Dick Cheney lied when he told us: There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us. Dick Cheney--not true. No one disagrees that Saddam Hussein was a brutal, murderous dictator, but it is now known he had nothing to do with 9/11. The Bush administration lied to the American people. Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. It was not connected to 9/11. The American people were misled by the Bush administration into believing that the Iraq war was necessary to prevent another 9/11, and Congress did not challenge them on those claims in a way that Congress should have--with disastrous consequences. That was a Republican administration. Now let me tell you about a Democratic administration where, once again, Congress refused to assert its constitutional responsibility. Let us go back to 1964, to a conflict that began under similarly false premises. President Lyndon Johnson cited an attack on a U.S. ship in the Gulf of Tonkin as a pretext for escalating the U.S. intervention in Vietnam and sending more and more and more troops into that quagmire. But we now know from declassified recordings that Johnson himself doubted that the USS Maddox had come under fire on August 4, 1964. As we all know, that alleged attack was used to push for the Gulf of Tonkin resolution authorizing Johnson to escalate U.S. military involvement in Vietnam, and we now know that the Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, misled Congress and the public in order to generate support for that resolution. You don't have to believe me. This is what LCDR Pat Paterson wrote in a paper for the U.S. Naval Institute: ``The evidence suggests a disturbing and deliberate attempt by Secretary of Defense McNamara to distort the evidence and mislead Congress.'' Paterson, interestingly enough, also quotes another author who wrote: To enhance his chances for election, [Johnson] and McNamara deceived the American people and Congress about events and the nature of the American commitment in Vietnam. They used a questionable report of a North Vietnamese attack on American naval vessels to justify the president's policy to the electorate and to defuse Republican senator and presidential candidate Barry Goldwater's charges that Lyndon Johnson was irresolute and ``soft'' in the foreign policy arena. Interestingly enough, that author is H.R. McMaster, President Trump's current National Security Advisor. Lyndon Johnson's administration misled both Congress and the American people into that war, just as the Bush administration misled us into the war in Iraq, and what disasters both of those wars were. The war in Vietnam nearly destroyed an entire generation of young people. Almost 60,000 died in that war, and God knows how many came back wounded in body and in spirit. It almost destroyed an entire generation. Yet Congress abdicated its responsibility in Vietnam, as it did in Iraq. The truth about Yemen is that U.S. forces have been actively engaged in support of the Saudi coalition in this war, providing intelligence and aerial refueling of planes whose bombs have killed thousands of people and made this humanitarian crisis far worse. U.S. involvement in the Yemen war has also proved counterproductive to the effort against al-Qaida's affiliates. The State Department's ``Country Reports on Terrorism 2016'' found that the conflict between Saudi-led forces and the Houthi insurgents has helped al-Qaida's and ISIS's Yemen branch to ``deepen their inroads across much of the country.'' In other words, as we see again, when there is chaos, when there is mass confusion, ISIS and their allies are able to jump in. Furthermore, while Iran's support for Houthi insurgents is of serious concern for all of us, the truth is that this war has increased, not decreased, the opportunities for Iranian interference. The Trump administration has tried to justify our involvement in the Yemen war as necessary to push back on Iran. Well, another administration told us that invading Iraq was necessary to confront al- Qaida, and another told us that the Vietnam war was necessary to contain Communists. None of that turned out to be true. The Congress, at those times, should have asked the hard questions, which they didn't ask. The Congress should have taken its constitutional role seriously and should have done what the Constitution demands that it do, and that is what my cosponsors and I are doing today. I see my colleague Senator Lee here. He has been very active in standing up for the Constitution on this issue, and I will yield to him in a minute. But here is the bottom line--and it is not a complicated line; the Constitution is clear: The U.S. Congress decides whether we go to war. There is no question in my mind that by aiding Saudi Arabia in the way that we are doing, we are assisting in war. We are in a conflict. If Members of the Senate think that conflict makes sense and is good public policy for the United States of America, vote down our resolution. If you agree with Senator Lee and me that it is a bad idea, support us. But what I would urge in the strongest possible terms is that Members of the Senate have to end the abdication of our constitutional responsibility. Accept it; vote yes or vote no. Do not vote to table this resolution and duck the constitutional responsibility that we have. I yield the floor to my colleague, Senator Mike Lee.

Mr. SANDERS. It seems to me we are talking about two separate issues, one of which is really a no-brainer. The no-brainer is that the Constitution is very clear that it is the Congress, not the President, that determines whether we go to war; that we are currently in an unauthorized war in Yemen; and that the first vote--if there is an attempt to table this, that would be absolutely unacceptable because we would be abdicating our decisionmaking. And then the second vote is the vote on whether we think it is a good idea to be in Yemen. Would the Senator agree with me that at least on the motion to table, every Member of the Senate should allow us to go forward and vote against tabling so that people in the Senate accept their constitutional responsibility to vote yes or no on the war in Yemen?

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, pursuant to section 1013 of the Department of State Authorization Act, fiscal years 1984 and 1985, and in accordance with the provisions of section 601(b) of the International Security Assistance and Arms Export Control Act of 1976, I make a motion to discharge S.J. Res. 54 from the Committee on Foreign Relations.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, may I ask my colleague from Utah a very simple question? Whether or not he agrees with me that we are talking about two separate issues.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, the resolution that we will soon be voting on is really very simple. It has two basic points. Point No. 1, I and the 14 other cosponsors of this resolution believe that under the definitions laid out in the 1973 War Powers Resolution, U.S. forces have been introduced into the Saudi-led war in Yemen, a war which is causing a humanitarian disaster. I would say to my good friend Senator Corker, the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, that this war has been going on for 3 years. Some 10,000 civilians in Yemen are dead and 40,000 have been wounded. A million are dealing with cholera right now, and millions have been displaced. You come tonight on the floor and you say: We are going to hold a hearing. That is good, but it is 3 years too late. The issue that we are dealing with right now is whether or not the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Congress accepts its constitutional responsibility on the issues of war. This is not a complicated issue, and I don't think anybody here disagrees. Article I, section 8, of the Constitution says not that the President can make war and send our young people into harm's way. It is the Congress of the United States that should make war. Our role now in Yemen working with the Saudi-led intervention there is one of hostilities under the War Powers Resolution of the United States. It is not just my view on this. As many may know here--as I suspect the chairman of the committee knows--last November, by a vote of 366 to 30, the U.S. House of Representatives agreed with the essence of what Senator Lee and I are trying to do, and the House passed a nonbinding resolution stating that U.S. involvement in the Yemen civil war is unauthorized. Every Member of the Democratic leadership voted for that, as did the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Ed Royce. An editorial in the New York Times today states: The United States initially deployed forces to combat Al Qaeda in Yemen under post-Sept. 11 congressional authorization measures. But Congress never specifically approved military involvement in the Saudi-Houthi war even though the Constitution and the 1973 War Powers Act give lawmakers a role. The New York Times: For too long, Congress has abdicated its role as America prolonged its stay in some wars and expanded into others. And presidents have been too reluctant to share these crucial decisions with lawmakers. Resolutions like this-- The one we are debating-- can and must force serious debate and accountability. I say this to my friend the chairman: I think now of the two major foreign policy disasters that have taken place in our lifetime--No. 1, the war in Vietnam. In that war--a Democratic administration under an otherwise very good President, Lyndon Johnson--he and the Secretary of Defense misled and lied to the American people with regard to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. That is now established fact as a result of declassified information. The United States got sucked into that war, and my generation--the young men of my generation--suffered so terribly. Over 60,000 died, and many others came home wounded in body and in spirit. The U.S. Congress abdicated its responsibility at that point in 1964. Fifteen years ago--oddly enough, on this day--there was the war in Iraq, under a Republican administration, and the administration lied to the American people again. Where was Congress getting the facts? We had the Vice President of the United States: Oh, Saddam Hussein is building weapons of mass destruction. There is a connection between Saddam Hussein and Iraq and the 9/11 perpetrators. It was a lie. It was a lie. Mistakenly, Congress voted to approve the war based on false information. So what I say today is that it is time for the Congress to accept its constitutional responsibility. I don't know how well we will do. Maybe we will screw it up as well. It is very possible. But that is what the Founding Fathers suggested, and I think they were right. We are closer to the people--the House and the Senate--than is the White House, this White House or any other White House. So there are two issues today. Do we accept our constitutional responsibility to vote on matters of war? I would suggest that every Member of the Senate vote yes. Don't duck your responsibility. Don't abdicate your responsibility. Second of all, this war in Yemen, in my view, has been a humanitarian disaster as a result of Saudi intervention. But the most important vote is, do we actually have a vote on whether American troops are involved in the war in Yemen? I hope very much we will vote against Senator Corker's motion to table, and I hope that after we do that, we will vote for the resolution that says it is time for the United States to get out of Yemen. Thank you.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I wish to thank the young people throughout this country who have the courage to do what the U.S. Congress is not doing; that is, to lead us forward in a way to lower the slaughter we are seeing from coast to coast in terms of gun violence. The bad news is that people continue to be killed every day. The good news is that the American people have come together around commonsense solutions to lower the level of gun violence we are experiencing. The American people know that we need to expand and improve background checks, that we need to do away with the gun show loophole, and that we need to do away with the straw man provisions. More and more Americans understand that we should ban the sale and distribution of military- style weapons. In my small State of Vermont between 2011 and 2016, 42 people were killed by guns. Some of them are Lara Sobel, Julie Falzarano, Regina Herring, Rhonda Herring, Molly Helland, Molly McLain, Kevin DeOliveira, Rhonda Gray, Marcus Austin, and Obafemi Adedapo. These are just some of the people who lost their lives to gun violence in Vermont. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I am distressed, although not surprised, by the objection. Apparently, the consumers of this country don't have the financial support to get their concerns onto the floor. So apparently we are not going to be discussing these items. Madam President, I raise a point of order that the pending measure violates section 4106 of H. Con. Res. 71, the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2018.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask my colleagues for support on the point of order, not only from the deficit perspective but to tell the Republican leadership here in Congress that we want a serious debate on the serious financial issues facing the American people; that we want the ability to bring forth amendments, not just my amendment--there are a lot of good amendments on both sides--that at this particular moment, rather than just deregulating some of the largest banks in America, we need to protect consumers, we need to protect ordinary Americans, and we need to have a real debate. So I would hope very much that Members of the Senate would support my point of order.

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, according to the latest Gallup poll, 81 percent of the American people disapprove of the way Congress is doing its job--81 percent. I suspect the other 19 percent are not really paying attention. If you want to know why the American people have so much anger and contempt for what goes on in Congress, it is because, time after time, what we are seeing is Congress under the Republican leadership doing exactly the opposite of what the American people want. This week could mark a new low for the Republican leadership in the Senate in terms of ignoring what the American people want and doing what they don't want. Today marks the 1-month anniversary of the tragic mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL. I just had the opportunity to be outside, in front of the Capitol, with thousands of beautiful, beautiful young people from all over--I think all over the country. The young people are saying to the Congress: Do something about the gun violence. Everyone knows there is not an easy solution; this is not an easy problem to solve. There are hundreds of millions of guns in this country. There are 5 million assault weapons. The young people are saying: Do something. Have the courage to take on the NRA. The American people overwhelmingly want to expand and improve background checks. They want to do away with the gun show loophole. They want to do away with the straw man provision. More and more people think we should be banning military-style assault weapons--whatever. The American people want us to do something. I don't see anything happening here. The American people want it. It is not happening. The American people want us to deal with the high cost of prescription drugs. In the State of Vermont, elderly people are cutting their pills in half. I don't see any legislation to deal with the high cost of prescription drugs, to have the courage to take on the pharmaceutical industry. The American people, overwhelmingly--Democrats, Republicans, Independents--want to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. I don't see anything happening on that issue. On issue after issue, the American people want action, and they are not getting it. What they are getting is exactly what they don't want but what powerful special interests do want. This month marks the 10th anniversary of the collapse of Bear Stearns, one of the largest investment banks in America, whose greed, recklessness, and illegal behavior triggered the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. What is the response of the U.S. Senate to that? Are we talking about breaking up the large banks that have become much larger? Is that what we are talking about? Are we talking about protecting consumers who are paying 20 percent, 25 percent in interest rates on products they buy at a department store? Are we talking about taking on the payday lenders who are squeezing the lifeblood out of poor people who, in desperation, have to borrow money from them? No, that is not what we are talking about. We are not talking about the need to guarantee healthcare to all people. We are not talking about the affordable housing crisis. We are not talking about the fact that millions of moms and dads in this country can't afford childcare. We are not talking about the global crisis of climate change. We are not talking about our crumbling infrastructure, our rigged trade deals that have resulted in the deindustrialization of America. That is not what we are talking about. What we are talking about at this particular moment, right here in the U.S. Senate, is the deregulation of some of the largest banks in America, some of the very same banks that nearly drove the economy off a cliff in 2008. That is what we are talking about. Just last week, the Congressional Budget Office told us that the legislation on the floor right now will ``increase the likelihood that a large financial firm with assets of between $100 billion and $250 billion would fail.'' We are not talking about protecting consumers. We are not talking about breaking up large banks. We are not talking about taking on the power of Wall Street. What we are talking about is deregulating some of the very same banks that drove this economy into the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. In other words, this legislation will make it more likely that we will see another financial crisis, another taxpayer bailout, and massive dislocation of our economy. What CBO tells us is that this legislation will increase the deficit by more than $450 million over the next decade--$450 million. This bill, which benefits some of the largest banks in America, will cost us over $450 million. Who is going to pay for that? The big banks? No. It will be the American taxpayers who will be picking up this tab. The question we have to ask ourselves, which we don't very often-- although the American people, I think, understand this emotionally in their guts--is this: How does it happen that a bill like this gets to the floor while we are not dealing with the issues the American people are concerned about, whether it is gun safety, whether it is DACA and protecting the 1.8 million young people who are eligible for that program, whether it is the high cost of prescriptions? How does this particular bill get to the floor of the Senate? The answer is pretty obvious. Follow the money. Since the 1990s, the financial sector has given more than $3.2 billion in campaign contributions. Let me repeat that. Since the 1990s, the financial sector--Wall Street, other parts of the financial sector--has given over $3.2 billion in campaign contributions. Last year alone, the financial sector spent over $200 million on lobbying. That is why Congress is spending day after day trying to make life easier for large financial institutions while continuing to ignore the needs of working families. Instead of listening to lobbyists in Washington, maybe, just maybe--I know it is a very radical idea, but maybe, just maybe, we might want to listen to the American people. The American people believe, as I do, that we should strengthen, not weaken Wall Street regulations. Now is not the time to be talking about deregulating large financial institutions. Now is the time to take on the greed and power of Wall Street, break up the large financial institutions in this country, and stop big banks from ripping off the American people by charging outrageous and usurious levels of interest rates. That is why I have submitted two amendments to this bill that I would like the Senate to vote on this afternoon. The first amendment would break up large financial institutions so that the taxpayers of this country will never have to bail them out again. The second amendment would establish a 15-percent cap on the interest rates private banks charge their customers on credit cards and other consumer loans. Before I talk about these amendments, let's be clear. Fraud is the business model of Wall Street. It is not the exception to the rule; it is the rule. Since 2009, major banks in this country have been fined more than $200 billion for reckless, unfair, and deceptive activities. By the way, those fines take place within a very weak regulatory climate, but here are just a few examples of the kinds of activities that large banks have engaged in. In August 2014, Bank of America paid $16 billion to settle charges that it lied to investors about the riskiness of the mortgage-backed securities it sold during the runup to the financial crisis. In November 2013, JPMorgan Chase settled for $13 billion for lying to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac about the quality of the mortgage-backed securities it sold them. Settlement documents revealed how every large bank in the United States committed mortgage fraud. In April of 2016, Goldman Sachs reached a $5 billion settlement for marketing and selling fraudulent mortgage-backed securities that were the foundation of the housing crisis. In July of 2014, Citigroup reached a $7 billion settlement for mortgage fraud. Then-Attorney General Eric Holder said that Citigroup's ``activities contributed mightily to the financial crisis that devastated our economy in 2008.'' If you are thinking that the illegal behavior of Wall Street executives was limited to the housing crisis, that it was a one-time thing, guess again. Let me give some more examples. In May of 2015, five banks, including JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup, paid $5.4 billion in fines after pleading guilty to ``a brazen display of collusion and foreign exchange rate market manipulation,'' according to then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch. In March of 2014, the FDIC accused 16 large banks, including Bank of America, Citigroup, and JPMorgan Chase, of fraud and conspiracy in an epic plot to manipulate bank-to-bank interest rates that underpinned at least $350 trillion in global financial transactions. In April of 2011, Wachovia was fined for laundering billions of dollars in illegal drug money. The Federal prosecutor said, ``Wachovia's blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance their operations.'' That was from the Federal prosecutor. The fine was less than 2 percent of the bank's $12.3 billion profit. On and on it goes. Mortgage fraud, money laundering, currency manipulation, bribery, conspiracy, rate tampering, and collusion are the routine practices of Wall Street; they are not the exception. This is their business model. Our country can no longer afford to tolerate the culture of fraud and corruption on Wall Street. Let us never, ever forget--although, I fear many people have already here in Congress--that during the financial crisis of 2008, the American people were told that they needed to bail out huge financial institutions because those institutions were too big to fail. Do people remember that? They were just too big to fail. If they had gone down, the whole economy would have gone down with them. Yet the four largest financial institutions in this country--JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo--are, on average, 80 percent larger today than they were before we bailed them out. Today, they are 80 percent larger than they were before we bailed them out because they were too big to fail. Does that make sense to anybody? Left alone, that is not even an issue that will be talked about here on the floor of the Senate. Incredibly, since the financial crisis, JPMorgan Chase has increased its assets by more than $1 trillion. Bank of America has seen its assets grow by more than $800 billion. Citigroup has grown by over $547 billion. After Wells Fargo acquired Wachovia, it nearly tripled in size. No single financial institution should be so large that its failure would cause a catastrophic risk to millions of Americans or to our Nation's economic well-being. No single financial institution should have holdings so extensive that its failure would send the world economy into crisis. If an institution is too big to fail, it is too big to exist, and we should break it up. Let me be very clear. We should not just be concerned about the danger these institutions pose to taxpayers. The enormous concentration of ownership within the financial sector is harming the middle class and damaging the economy by limiting choices and raising prices for consumers and small businesses. Today--and it is important that people understand this, but unfortunately it is not an issue that is discussed at all, not here in Congress and not much in the media--the six largest banks in America have over $10 trillion in assets, equivalent to 54 percent of the GDP in America. When we talk about having the United States move in the direction of an oligarchy, when we talk about a handful of institutions and billionaires controlling the economic and political life of this country, this is what we are talking about. Let me repeat. The six largest banks in America have over $10 trillion in assets, equivalent to 54 percent of our GDP. The top six banks hold more than half of all credit card debt, control over 90 percent of all bank derivatives, underwrite about a third of all mortgages, and control over 40 percent of all bank deposits. If Teddy Roosevelt were alive today, I have a sense about what he would be saying. He would say break them up, and he would be right. That is exactly what my first amendment would do. Specifically, this amendment would require the Federal Reserve to break up any financial institution whose total exposure is greater than 2 percent of our Nation's GDP over the next 2 years. These banks would include JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, U.S. Bancorp, PNC Financial Services, Capital One, and the TD Group--financial institutions that have a combined total exposure of more than 77 percent of our Nation's GDP. None of these institutions would be able to receive a taxpayer bailout from the Federal Reserve or gamble with the federally insured bank deposits of the American people. Under this amendment, no financial institution could have a total financial exposure above $398 billion. Call me old-fashioned, but I believe the function of banking should be boring. The function of banking should not be about making as much profit as possible in gambling on derivatives and other esoteric financial instruments. The function of banking should be to provide affordable loans to small businesses in order to create jobs in the productive economy. The function of banking should be to provide affordable loans to Americans to purchase their homes and their cars. Wall Street cannot be an island unto itself, and I hope very much that my colleagues will support this important amendment. Not only do we have to break up these very large banks, but we also have to stop them from ripping off the American people by their charging outrageous interest rates and fees, and that is exactly what my second amendment would do. Incredibly, since the Wall Street crash, credit card companies have raked in over $1.2 trillion in revenue from interest and fees they charge consumers, including over $160 billion in 2016 alone. That is unacceptable. At a time when the American people hold a recordbreaking $1 trillion in credit card debt and desperately need some relief on that debt, my second amendment would establish a national usury rate of 15 percent on credit cards and other consumer loans. In America today, incredibly, millions of our people are now paying credit card interest rates of 20, 25, or even 30 percent. I am not just talking about the payday lenders who are acting in a way that is totally unbelievable in ripping off the poorest people in our country. Let's be clear. When credit card companies charge over 20 percent in interest on credit cards, they are not engaged in the business of making credit available; what they are involved in is extortion and loan sharking. That is what they are engaged in. Interestingly enough, if you read the religious tenets of the major religions throughout history, whether it be Christianity, Judaism, or Islam, what you will find is a universal objection and disgust to usury. This has existed for thousands and thousands of years. People know that it is immoral to lend money to poor people, struggling people, and then charge them excessive interest rates. That is in the religious teachings of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and other religions. In the ``Divine Comedy,'' Dante reserved a special place in the Seventh Circle of Hell for people who charged usurious interest rates. Today, we don't need the hellfire and the pitchforks, and we don't need the rivers of boiling blood, but we do need a national usury law that caps interest rates on credit cards and consumer loans at 15 percent. Despite the fact that banks can borrow money today at less than 1.5 percent from the Fed, the average credit card interest rate today for consumers is now 16.84 percent. Borrow money at 1.5 percent from the Fed, and then charge consumers an average of 16.84 percent. Further, if you get a credit card from a store like Macy's, Kohl's, Lowe's, or Sears, interest rates are even higher. Stores like these are charging customers an average interest rate of 26 percent, and many of the stores rely on these high interest rate cards for more than a third of their revenue. They are making money not just by selling clothing or washing machines or shoes; a substantial part of their profit scheme comes from the high interest rates they are getting on these financial transactions. What that means is, if you buy a $500 refrigerator from Lowe's, Home Depot, or Sears on one of their credit cards, you will likely owe an additional $130 in interest on a $500 refrigerator. How is that? Do you think that is an issue we might want to talk about just for a moment? I know the consumers of this country don't pour hundreds of millions of dollars into lobbying or billions of dollars into campaign contributions. I understand that. But maybe, just maybe, we might want to remember the folks back home. Establishing a usury law is not a radical concept. Up until 1978, about half of the States in our country had usury laws on the books that capped credit card interest rates, but those States' interest rates were obliterated by a 1978 Supreme Court decision, that of Marquette National Bank v. First of Omaha Service, which concluded that national banks could charge whatever interest rates they wanted if they moved to a State without a usury law. So all of these credit card companies moved to South Dakota. They moved to Delaware, which had no interest rate caps, and they charged people in Vermont or in Kansas--or in every other State in the country--interest rates of 20 to 30 percent. This has to stop. The American people are sick and tired of being ripped off by the same financial institutions they bailed out 10 years ago--what a world. We bail out the crooks-- taxpayer money bails them out--and they charge the same people who bailed them out 20 to 30 percent interest rates on loans. This amendment simply applies the same statutory interest rate cap on credit cards that Congress imposed on credit unions in 1980, capping interest rates at 15 percent, except under extraordinary circumstances. In other words, if you get a credit card through a credit union, you are going to be paying, in almost every case, no more than 15 percent. That is mandated by Federal law. By and large, that law has worked for about 40 years. Unlike big banks, credit unions do not come begging the American taxpayer for huge bailouts. Ten years ago they didn't come for a huge bailout. Credit unions have survived and thrived on a 15-percent cap, and the time has come to extend that cap to private banks as well. There is nothing radical about that. It exists for the credit unions in this country, and it should exist for the large banks. There has even been support for this concept in the Senate. In 1991, former Senator Al D'Amato offered an amendment to cap interest rates at 14 percent that passed on a vote of 74 to 14. It was not a radical idea, and it passed by a huge vote in 1991. Here is what Al D'Amato, the Republican chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, said in 1991: Fourteen percent is certainly a reasonable rate of interest for banks to charge customers for credit card debt. It allows a comfortable profit margin but keeps banks in line so that interest rates rise and fall with the health of the economy. That was an accurate statement in 1991. It is even more accurate today. Let's be clear. Credit cards are no longer used just to buy luxury items. We all know that. All over this country, people are buying their groceries, their food, and other basic essentials with credit cards. Commuters are paying for the gas they put into their cars on their credit cards. Young people are paying their college expenses with credit cards. According to the Federal Reserve, 44 percent of the American people could not pay for a $400 emergency expense, like a car accident, if they could not charge it on their credit cards or borrow money from a payday lender, a friend, or a family member. That is the reality of America today. It is not a reality we discuss here in the Senate, but that is the reality, nonetheless. Given that reality, it seems to me that if we are going to respond to the needs of the American people, we need to deal with the issue of usury and stop large financial institutions from ripping off the American people. Madam President, with that in mind, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up and reported by number: the Sanders amendment No. 2114 and the Sanders amendment No. 2155; further, that the Senate vote on the Sanders amendment No. 2114 without intervening action or debate; and that following disposition of the Sanders amendment No. 2114, the Senate vote on the Sanders amendment No. 2155.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Well, let me thank Senator Murphy for his comments and Senator Lee before him. I think they touch on the most important issues. I wish to respond to what Senator Lee and Senator Murphy both said, but I wish to make a point that needs to be made again and again. This is not a partisan issue. We are talking about Democratic administrations acting militarily without congressional authorization. We are talking about Republican administrations doing the same. Senator Lee is a conservative Republican. Senator Murphy is a Democrat. I am an Independent who caucuses with the Democrats. So if you are talking about bipartisanship, you are looking at it right here. I should tell you that there are many organizations around the country--conservative and progressive--that are raising exactly the same issue that we are raising right here, and that is that Congress has to reassert its congressional authority over the issues of war. If you want to go to war and you think the war in Yemen makes sense, that is fine. Come down here on the floor and tell us why you feel that way. Tell the American people and tell your constituents why you think it is a good idea to work with Saudi Arabia to wreak utter horror on one of the poorest countries in the world. Fine, come on down here and tell us. What we have to do, from a precedent point of view, is finally to say to our Republican President or a Democratic President: Enough is enough. Listen to the Constitution. The Founding Fathers of this country were amazingly smart on this issue, and they understood that before we send our young men--and now women--off to war to die or to get maimed, there better well be a very good reason that we have to explain to the people who elected us--not just somebody sitting up there in the Oval Office. That is why the authority for going to war is vested in the representatives of the people, whether we are elected for 2 years or elected for 6 years. I would also point out that this is not the first time that the Congress has weighed in on the devastating war in Yemen. In November of last year, the House of Representatives--and I hope my Senate colleagues know this--voted by a vote of 366 to 30. That was not even close. There was overwhelming support among Democrats and Republicans. They passed a nonbinding resolution stating that the United States' involvement in the Yemen civil war is unauthorized. The Democratic leadership supported it, as did the Republican chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Ed Royce. Here is the bottom line. The bottom line is that Congress has ducked its responsibilities for many years, and if we continue to duck our responsibility on the all-important issue of U.S. military intervention, this Congress and, in fact, the people of the United States become increasingly irrelevant on this most important matter. We are bringing forward a privileged motion. There will be a vote on this issue in one form or another. If you like the war in Yemen, then be prepared to defend why you think it is a great idea to work with the Saudis to destroy the infrastructure and to create a situation where famine and cholera are rampant in that incredibly poor country. Come on down and tell us why you think it is a good idea. If not, I hope you will vote with us to end this war and to allow the United States to get involved in bringing the warring parties together to see if we can bring peace and to see if we can bring humanitarian relief to these terribly suffering people. I yield to Senator Lee.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I say to Senator Lee that I think that is an excellent question. That was just the question that I was going to ask of Senator Murphy, because I think we understand that in recent history, when there is chaos and confusion in a country, it provides an extraordinary opportunity for al-Qaida and their allies to move in. We have spent billions and billions of dollars fighting al-Qaida and their affiliates, and I fear very much, as you have indicated, that the situation we are creating in Yemen in many ways is making life easier for them. I would ask this of Senator Murphy--and maybe listeners might be surprised by this: What side of this battle is al-Qaida on in Yemen right now?

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Illinois very much for his perceptive remarks and for reminding us that the time is long overdue for the U.S. Congress to accept its constitutional responsibilities. I wanted to ask Senator Lee if he--we are running out of time here-- has some closing remarks.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me conclude by thanking Senator Lee, Senator Murphy, Senator Durbin this afternoon, thanking Senator Booker, Senator Warren, Senator Leahy, Senator Markey, Senator Feinstein, and Senator Wyden for their cosponsorship of S.J. Res. 54. Let me summarize it very briefly in this way: Congress cannot continue to abdicate its responsibility on the all-important issue of how and when the United States becomes involved in military intervention. We cannot continue to run away from that issue. If you think the war in Yemen and siding with the Saudis on this war makes sense, then come down to the floor of the Senate, make your position clear, tell your constituents what you believe, and then vote for the war but have the courage, at least, to accept your responsibility as a Member of the U.S. Congress and not abdicate it to the President. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to use an oversized visual poster to be displayed during my remarks.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Wyden be added as a cosponsor to my resolution, S.J. Res. 54.