John Thune

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Indiana (Mr. Braun), the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Cotton), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cruz), the Senator from Mississippi (Mrs. Hyde-Smith), the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Paul), the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Schmitt), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Scott), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker). Futher, if present and voting, the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Schmitt) would have voted ``yea'' and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Scott) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Scott), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from Florida (Mr. Scott) would have voted ``yea'' and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``yea'' and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``nay'' and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee) would have voted ``yea.''

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

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, we recently learned that fiscal year 2023 set a new record for the number of illegal immigrants apprehended at the southern border--the third recordbreaking year of illegal immigration under the Biden administration. First, fiscal year 2021 set an alltime record. Then, fiscal year 2022 broke that record. And, now, fiscal 2023 has broken that record. In other words, we have had 3 straight years of the Biden border crisis getting worse and worse and worse. Since the President took office, more than 6.2 million individuals have been caught attempting to illegally cross our southern border--6.2 million. If every one of those individuals lived in one city, it would be the second largest in the country. I don't need to tell anyone that the kind of unchecked illegal immigration we are experiencing represents a serious security threat. The Department of Homeland Security recently noted in its 2024 threat assessment: Terrorists and criminal actors may exploit the elevated flow [of migration] and increasingly complex security environment to enter the United States. And by all indications, bad actors are, in fact, taking advantage of the chaos at the border to try and enter the United States. During fiscal year 2023 alone, 169 individuals on the Terrorist Watchlist were caught attempting to illegally cross our southern border--169 on the Terrorist Watchlist. Those are the ones they apprehended. That is more than in the previous 6 years combined. The head of the Border Patrol recently said that his Agency is arresting an average of more than 47 people per day who have ``serious criminal histories''--more than 47 people per day with serious criminal histories. Those are just the individuals who are being caught. Since January 2021, when President Biden took office, there have been more than 1.7 million known ``got-aways.'' Those are individuals the Border Patrol saw but was unable to apprehend. We can only imagine the number of unknown ``got-aways'' who have sneaked into the country. How many of those individuals have ``serious criminal histories'' or hail from hostile countries? We just don't know, but we can be pretty confident that among those ``got-aways'' are dangerous individuals who should not be entering our country. This is a serious issue, and we need a serious course correction from this administration. Vice President Harris, who is in charge of overseeing border policies for this administration, recently told ``60 Minutes'' that ``we need a safe, orderly, and humane border policy.'' This has been the purported goal of the Biden administration for almost 3 years now, but the administration has been failing on all three counts. The current crisis we are experiencing is a predictable result of the Biden administration's decisions. Before the President took office, his team was warned of the possibility of a migrant surge. Yet the moment the President took office, he set about dismantling the immigration policies of his predecessor and weakening our border's security, and the result has been, as I said, 3 successive years of recordbreaking illegal immigration. While the Biden administration has finally started to, at least halfheartedly, acknowledge our Nation's border crisis and put in place policies attempting to encourage legal migration and penalize illegal border crossings, the changes are insufficient--far too little, far too late--or, as one columnist recently put it in the Washington Post, ``The Biden administration's various efforts have amounted to Band-Aids on a massive, open wound.'' The President's recent supplemental funding request has not left me hopeful that the administration is suddenly going to become more effective. Potentially billions of dollars in reimbursement for blue States struggling to house illegal immigrants won't do a single thing to solve the crisis we are facing at the border. While the President's proposal does include some funding that would actually go toward security, funding alone is simply not enough. We need meaningful policy changes that will, for starters, end the rampant abuse of our asylum system and sweeping parole designations. Senators Graham, Lankford, and Cotton, among several others, are working hard to craft a set of changes to our asylum and parole policies that would stem the flow at our southern border. These changes would address obvious flaws in President Biden's immigration policies and make tangible progress toward getting our border crisis under control. Recent events have underscored the importance of national security, and a porous southern border is a huge--huge--vulnerability when it comes to our national security. We need to use every tool we can to secure the border and keep terrorists and criminals out of the United States. Senate Republicans are committed to putting policies in place at the border that keep Americans safe, and I hope that, in the days and weeks to come, Senate Democrats will join us to make securing our border a priority. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: The Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``aye.''

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis), and the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Vance). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``yea'' and the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Vance) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). The Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, Hamas's brutal attack on Israel on October 7 has thrust not just Hamas but Iran into the spotlight. Why? Because, while Hamas may have carried out this attack, Iran enabled it and is currently enabling terrorist organizations throughout the Middle East. There is Hamas, which gets approximately 90 percent of its military budget from Iran and benefits from Iranian training and weapons. Then there is Hezbollah, the terrorist organization on Israel's northern border with Lebanon, which is also armed and financed by Iran. Then there are the Houthis in Yemen, who are backed by Iran and who, in the aftermath of October 7, fired missiles and drones headed in the direction of Israel, likely at Iran's direction. There are the Shia militias who are attacking American soldiers in Iraq and Syria, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the list literally goes on. As I said on the floor last week, through its proxies, Iran is literally getting away with murder. One has to wonder what the Middle East would look like today if Iran hadn't spent decades funding and arming terrorist organizations. Nor are Iran's malign activities confined to the Middle East. Iran has provided Russia with drones to use in its war of aggression against Ukraine, and now it appears that Iran is helping Russia to build a drone manufacturing facility to dramatically increase Russia's drone supply. Meanwhile, Russia's Foreign Minister was in Iran last week and met with the Iranian President. A Reuters article on the meeting reported: Russia and Iran are firming up bilateral relations in a `trusting' atmosphere, Russia's foreign ministry said . . . Mr. President, Iran doesn't just represent a danger to peace and stability in the Middle East and beyond. It is directly responsible for much of the strife that we see there. And in the wake of the October 7 attack and Israel's military response, Iran has threatened Israel with escalation and a war on ``multiple fronts.'' It is time to make clear to Iran that its deadly activities can't continue. The Biden administration must clearly articulate to the Iranians that if they do not stand down or if they green-light any escalation against Israel, the United States and our allies will respond. In the meantime, the administration should be exploring all avenues for ending Iran's career as a state sponsor of terror. Israel and the Arab world deserve a chance to move forward, free of Iran's malign meddling. President Biden and his administration do not have the strongest track record on Iran--witness their misguided attempts to reboot the Obama administration's problematic nuclear deal and the decision to unfreeze $6 billion in Iranian funds as part of a deal to free American prisoners. The President did, finally, listen to calls from myself and others in the wake of Hamas's attack to once again freeze that $6 billion, and the administration was right to move more U.S. forces into the region to deter escalation and to respond to attacks on U.S. troops. But it is clear that a lot more needs to be done if we want to stop Iran from funding terror. I am disappointed that the President has continued in his choice of Jack Lew as Ambassador to Israel. Mr. Lew played a key role in developing and carrying out the Obama administration's misguided nuclear deal, and his nomination does not exactly send the message to Iran that the Biden administration will be cracking down on Iranian warmongering. Thirty-three Americans died as a result of Hamas's October 7 act, and as many as 10 Americans are still likely trapped as hostages, with hundreds of other Americans still stuck in Gaza. Meanwhile, a number of American military personnel have been injured in drone attacks in Iraq and Syria carried out by Iran-backed groups. Add the more than 1,400 individuals who died in Hamas's October 7 attack and countless other terrorism-related deaths in the Middle East and it becomes very clear that Iran's hands are stained with the blood of thousands. If there is to be any hope of peace in the Middle East, if there is to be any hope for a brighter and more secure future for Israelis and Palestinians and many others, then Iran's career as a state sponsor of terror must be ended. And I will do everything I can with my colleagues in Congress to see that that is accomplished. And I hope the Biden administration will do the same. It is time to end Iran's reign of terror.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). The Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``nay'' and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Barrasso), the Senator from Utah (Mr. Lee), the Senator from Idaho (Mr. Risch), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott).