Peter Welch

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, we are here discussing the nomination of the next potential Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth. Of course that job, as we all know, is probably the second most difficult job in the country. He presides over the welfare of 3.4 million people in Active service and Active Reserve all around the world. He presides over a budget of $850 billion. The person who has that position has to be a preeminent strategic thinker: How do we modernize our Navy? How do we recruit in the modern world? How do we maintain force preparedness? How do we cement strategic alliances? It is a job that you can't just show up and start doing; there has to be behind it a lifetime experience that gives you some capacity to be able to do all of these things and respond to the emergencies that inevitably arise when you get that phone call at 3 in the morning. There has been a lot of discussion by my colleagues about the lack of experience of Mr. Hegseth. I share that concern. There has been a lot of discussion about his views on women in the military, and our distinguished Senator Tammy Duckworth is the most preeminent example of the capacity of women to serve effectively and bravely. Mr. Hegseth has repudiated his well-founded, longstanding view that he is against women in the military. Frankly, it sounds to me like a nomination-eve consideration. Speaking, of course, to the Presiding Officer, I really respect the military service he has provided to our country. But the big concern I have about Mr. Hegseth, in addition to the character issues, the experience issues, and the drinking issues--and by the way, I am puzzled as to his assertion that if he gets the job, he will stop drinking. Why wait? But here is the concern I have: Unlike the Presiding Officer, I did not serve in the military. My draft lottery number was high--this was during Vietnam--and I wasn't drafted. Many of my college classmates were. They served in Vietnam. Some of them came home injured, and some did not come home. I think about them every day and how it is that they served. Some were badly injured, and some died. When I think about the situation most Americans are in, most of us didn't serve, but all of us who didn't serve are so indebted to those who did. My high school classmates were like the young people I see now who are volunteering to go into the military. So we as Americans have a profound obligation to honor the service of those who volunteer to respond to the call of the Commander in Chief, who says: You are going to be deployed. They don't know where. They are not involved in the discussion of whether. They are not involved in the discussion of when. They show up. Our democracy so profoundly depends on the idealism of young people who are willing to subject themselves to the decisions of the Commander in Chief, and I believe that every one of us here who is involved in the decisions about authorizing the use of military force has an absolutely profound obligation to do that with care because the folks who are going to do the work and be in harm's way are going to be there because we sent them there. It is why I have been so insistent, as have many of us here, that we have to have a good VA, that we have to have medical care for our soldiers and sailors and airmen and marines. But what we need, too, is a Secretary of Defense who honors that idealism of these young Americans who decide to enlist. That idealism is borne in a sense of common commitment, a sense of wanting to do something for the common good, and it is also to live by the code of military conduct. There is great honor in our services. Those men and women whom I so admire know they may have to use lethal force to defend our values, to defend our country, to protect their fellow soldiers, but they know there are limits, and they use it when they must but never more than that. By the way, that is asking a lot of our soldiers, to be restrained when they are in a combat zone and can be killed themselves. So what distresses me so much about Mr. Hegseth is how he used his very powerful forum on FOX TV, in my view, to dishonor the soldiers who acted with restraint and valor and integrity by taking up the cause of some of our soldiers--there are not many of them, but they do exist-- who kill people, who use violence not in furtherance of our defense but for their own reasons. I am speaking about Mr. Lorance. Clint Lorance was a soldier. He was sent, in 2012, as a new commander without combat experience to lead a platoon of young soldiers who were deployed to Afghanistan with the mission of defeating the local Taliban and winning over the area's population--an incredibly hard task. But one day, for reasons Mr. Lorance--then Soldier Lorance--knew, he threatened to kill a farmer and his son, a 3- or 4-year-old boy. A day later, he ordered his men to shoot within inches of unarmed villagers--that was including near children. He said: It is funny watching the villagers dance. Mr. Lorance's men, who were honorable, brave, willing to be in harm's way, and willing to act like warriors but were not ever willing to kill indiscriminately, balked at his orders. And you know how hard that is to do if you are a soldier when you are given an order even if you know it is the wrong order. Then they were told to make false reports about taking fire from the village to justify this conduct, but they refused to do it. The next day, Lorance ordered fire on unarmed Afghans who were over 100 yards from the platoon. They were killed. They filed a false report claiming the bodies couldn't be reached. The people I honor are the people under his command who refused to take those orders. The people I honor are soldiers whose bravery extends not just to putting their own physical well-being in harm's way but who maintain that commitment to the ideals of the military code of conduct that give us the standing and legitimacy that are so important to our well-being. So my problem is this: I want a Secretary of Defense who is as good as the soldiers he leads. Mr. Hegseth, in my view, fails to meet that standard. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, in the United States, we believe in the peaceful transfer of power. In the United States, we believe that the people--not elected politicians--decide who is their President. And both of those principles have served our democracy very well through thick and thin, through strife and turmoil, for the past 248 years. Both of those principles were challenged on January 6, 2021. A mob that was incited by then-President Trump attacked the Capitol for the explicit purpose of using violence to overturn the peaceful transfer of power. They were trying to intimidate elected politicians to substitute their judgment, their preferred candidate for President, instead of acknowledging the will of the people that they represented. But our democracy endured. That is the very good news. And in testament to that, we just witnessed a renewal of America's commitment to the peaceful transfer of power with the inauguration of Donald Trump as our 47th President. However, I speak today, sadly, about one of the first actions of President Trump, and that, of course, is pardoning 1,600 people and commuting sentences of 14 very dangerous criminals who were involved in that violent attack on January 6. Speaking for myself, I condemn that action by President Trump. I was there that day. Many of us were. I was in the Gallery of the House of Representatives. It is a day I won't forget, but America will never forget. It has had a deep impact on our country, the citizens, the folks who work here, and that honorable tradition of the peaceful transfer of power. You know, I was very amazed and proud to see officers--men and women--who withstood this assault. More than 150 officers from the U.S. Capitol Police and the DC Metropolitan Police Department were injured that day. Five officers died in the aftermath, and there was severe damage to the Senate Chamber, the House Chamber, the office buildings, and the Capitol Rotunda, where we just had another inauguration only a few days ago. Blood, feces, glass, and other debris from the mob's attack was everywhere at a cost of close to $3 million. So how is it that one of the first acts of our President, who wants to be a unifier, was to pardon those people who acted with such violence, such anger, and such contempt? President Trump has tried to erase this attack and rewrite the history of what happened on January 6, calling the insurrectionists, including those who fought with the police, patriots and hostages. They were neither. Should the President of the United States pardon a person who was sentenced to 57 months in Federal prison for stealing a police riot shield from an officer and then using it to assault officers? Should a person who is affiliated with the neo-Nazi group and who was serving a sentence for breaking the law in Charlottesville in 2017 and who quoted Hitler before assaulting law enforcement in the U.S. Capitol, should that person be pardoned? I say no. Should a President pardon a person who led an organization who orchestrated this riot after being convicted by a jury of impartial citizens and being convicted of seditious conspiracy? I say no. Should a President pardon a person who was sentenced to more than 6 years for beating the police with a metal whip, assaulting them with bear spray--something that can cause lasting eye damage--should that person be pardoned? I say no. Should a person who, at his own trial, said he didn't think he was subject to the laws governing the United States and who, before storming the Capitol, bragged that what the British did to DC will be nothing compared to what he does? Should that person be pardoned? I say no. Should a person who said many of us should be hanged, should that person be pardoned? I say no. I am very proud of the men and women of our law enforcement community, U.S. Capitol Police and DC Metropolitan Police Department who stood their positions and defended the Capitol and defended the peaceful transfer of power. And I have in mind someone who was standing over me in the Capitol when I was in the Gallery and the mob was trying to break down the doors, breaking the glass of the House Chamber, and this officer was a young man who commuted to work from about an hour away. He had two young children. He had his gun out, and I looked in his face, and I could see the last thing in the world he wanted to do was have to use that weapon. But I saw that he was going to do his job and whatever was required to protect the people who were in that Gallery. And I just thought to myself, How is it that the people who are attacking could have such disregard for the reality of this person's life and how much it would change his life if he actually had to use that firearm? And I am proud, too, of Officer Brian Sicknick, who lost his life; Officer Howard Liebengood; Officer Jeffrey Smith; Officer Gunther Hashida; Officer Kyle DeFreytag, all of whom died in the aftermath of January 6th. These presidential pardons are disrespectful. They are also dangerous. They are disrespectful to the men and women who served, who suffered the violence, and are living with the consequences. And they are dangerous to the men and women of law enforcement who serve us every day. The pardons validate the violence of the mob and dishonor the service of those who protect us. These unconscionable and appalling actions of January 6 should be repudiated by every Member of Congress. And whatever differences we have, it is vital that those differences be resolved at the ballot box and that the will of the people always be respected. No citizen, however passionate they may be about their political beliefs, no matter how disappointed they may be at the outcome of an election, is justified in attacking the men and women of the Capitol Police. Their actions should be condemned by each of us and by our President. Those actions should not be condoned with pardons. I yield the floor. (Mr. MORENO assumed the Chair.)

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, in his last week in office, President Biden removed Cuba from the list of State Sponsors of Terrorism, a designation imposed by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in the final days of the first Trump administration. That designation has caused, directly and indirectly, great hardship for the Cuban people who are currently experiencing the worst poverty in a generation. At the same time, the designation, and the other sanctions imposed by the United States, have achieved none of the intended goals. Cuba remains a one-party state where political dissent is not tolerated. President Biden rightly determined there is no evidence that Cuba sponsors international terrorism. That has been true for many years, and his decision was long overdue. But the reaction of those who have supported the terrorism designation was predictable. When asked if Cuba is a sponsor of terrorism, now-Secretary of State Rubio answered, ``Without question.'' If the facts and the law supported that claim, I would agree. But the State Sponsor of Terrorism designation has become a transparently political determination, not one based on the facts or the law. Under the law, countries determined by the Secretary of State to have ``repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism'' are designated as state sponsors. There is no ambiguity. The law explicitly refers to ``international terrorism.'' But even those who claim Cuba belongs on the list of state sponsors have failed to produce any evidence that it supports acts of international terrorism. Instead, they cite Cuba's harboring of American fugitives from justice, none of whom were charged or convicted of international terrorism. They cite Cuba's support for the Maduro government in Venezuela, which has not been designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism. And they cite the role that Cuba has played, like Norway, as a facilitator of negotiations between the FARC and, more recently, the ELN and the Colombian Government, which has called for Cuba to be removed from the list. There is plenty to dislike about the Cuban Government. It represses dissidents and mismanages its economy. It consistently blames the U.S. for its own failures. But there is plenty of blame to go around, and our policy of sanctions, isolation, and hostility has unquestionably contributed to the daily hardships suffered by the Cuban people. It is therefore very disappointing that President Trump, in an executive order on his first day in office, redesignated Cuba as a State Sponsor of Terrorism. He was once again pressured to do so, as he was during his first term, by the same vocal minority who believe that by making the lives of the Cuban people as miserable as possible they will topple the government. By doing so President Trump has made a mockery of the list of states that do sponsor international terrorism, like Iran and North Korea. It is not a list of pariah countries. It is not a list of countries whose governments violate human rights. Under the law, it is not even a list of countries that support domestic terrorism. Cuba does not belong on the list of State Sponsors of Terrorism, and by relisting Cuba, the President has ignored the law.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, 4 months ago I made a statement about the murder of Honduran indigenous environmental defender and anti- corruption activist Juan Lopez, on September 14, 2024, who at that time was the latest victim of an ongoing epidemic of vigilante violence in that country. As I mentioned then, my office, like others in Congress, had received reports of recurring threats, attacks, arbitrary arrests, and assassinations of members of the Guapinol, Tocoa, and other communities in the Bajo Aguan region of Honduras. The crimes were intended to silence those who opposed the Los Pinares open-pit iron oxide mine and the Ecotek Thermoelectric Project in an indigenous reserve which threaten their livelihoods and the region's environment, and who challenged the companies and corrupt officials who profit from those projects. Mr. Lopez, a winner of the Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Award in 2019, had been a victim of wrongful imprisonment, false prosecution, and had spoken out against corrupt officials in Tocoa. His assassination was the latest in a pattern of similar killings that have not resulted in justice. Of the six other assassinations of members of the Guapinol water defenders, no one has been prosecuted or punished, nor for the murders of scores of other social activists, journalists, and human rights defenders in Honduras. Last September, I urged the following steps to be taken immediately: Convene an international commission of experts to support the Honduran prosecutor's investigation, to ensure the investigation is credible, thorough, and impartial; Provide protection for human rights defenders at risk in the Bajo Aguan region; and investigate the abuses and corruption denounced by Juan Lopez and the pattern of violence against the Guapinol defenders. In the months since Mr. Lopez was killed, the Honduran Government has said that it detained three people who were responsible. That is encouraging. But government officials believe that the person who ordered the killing is still at large. Also, according to press reports, Honduran prosecutors formally accused company leaders and local government officials connected to the mine of illegally exploiting resources, abusing authority, and ``environmental crimes'' for mining in the indigenous reserve. Yet people living in the area say the mining hasn't stopped. After the assassination in May 2016 of Berta Caceres, another Honduran indigenous leader who led protests against the construction of a hydroelectric dam and won the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize, international pressure pushed the Honduran Government to arrest and prosecute one of the top officials of the construction company. But he is challenging his conviction, and it is widely believed that there may be others who were responsible and have not been charged. Before and after her election in 2021, Honduran President Xiomara Castro pledged to combat corruption and impunity, including partnering with the United Nations to establish an international commission for this purpose. Her term ends in November 2025, when a new President will be elected in Honduras, yet there has been minimal progress toward establishing the promised commission. Corruption and impunity remain deeply entrenched in the Honduran public and private sectors. Not only do those of us who care about justice in Honduras want to see all those responsible for the murders of Berta Caceres, Juan Lopez, and the other land and water defenders prosecuted and punished, we also want to be able to support a new Honduran commission against corruption and impunity. That would be a crucial, tangible way for President Castro to demonstrate that she not only replaced Juan Orlando Hernandez, her predecessor who was sentenced to 45 years in a U.S. prison for cocaine and weapons trafficking, but she also dismantled the criminal enterprise that enriched him, his brother, and their cronies. Otherwise, the Honduran people will continue to suffer from the spiraling poverty and violence and bear the costs and consequences of the complicity of yet another corrupt government in undermining the rule of law. As I said last September, the people of the Bajo Aguan should not have to live in fear that powerful companies and corrupt officials will steal their land, pollute their rivers, and murder courageous leaders like Juan Lopez and Berta Caceres for peacefully defending the natural resources that are rightfully theirs.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, the situation for working families in Vermont is really, really hard. They show up and work. They get a paycheck. And, at the end of the month, when they try to pay their bills, there is not enough there. The situation for families is enormously insecure when it comes to housing. We find Vermonters who are working at ski areas can't live within an hour of the ski lift that they are attending. We find that folks in factories who want to live in the community they grew up in can't afford a house. They are competing, oftentimes, with cash buyers, usually from out of State, and it is folks who are in the economy who have the assets and have ridden the rising stock market--and good for them. But we need a tax system that is good for working families. People want to work. They want to pay their bills. They don't want to have the constant anxiety of whether they are going to miss a mortgage payment or they are going to miss a rent payment. To have a discussion about a tax policy that essentially funnels money to folks who have done extremely well raises a fairness question, which my colleagues have talked to, but it also raises a very practical question about how do you grow an economy. You can only grow an economy if folks who are working and committed to the communities they are in can pay their bills, can earn what they need in order to pay the grocery bill and to pay rent and healthcare. That is why the starting point of tax reform should be addressing family needs that, by the way, are employer needs. The childcare tax credit really worked. It meant that families were able to afford things, and we saw the results with a 50-percent reduction in childhood poverty. What we also see is that when we can put money into education so families can be secure about a safe place and a good place for their kids to go to school, that will work. So our starting point should be: How does this help the paycheck for the working family? And that is pretty simple: the earned-income tax credit, the child tax credit, low-income housing credits to build the housing that we need. That is where we have to start. Funneling money to folks who are doing really well and who have a massive amount of discretionary income and where, for corporations, the capital that they need to invest is there--there is not a capital shortage. We need to focus on families, not on the well-to-do and the corporations that got a reduction in taxes that was far more than they even requested. The second point I want to make is about the process that is being used to pass the tax bill or to consider it. It is the reconciliation process. By definition, what that means is it will be a Republican-only bill. There will be no discussion among Democrats, where we have some point of views that, by the way, are really beneficial to folks in my State, whether they voted for Harris or they voted for Trump. A lot of working families need that childcare tax credit. The reconciliation process means that the political tradeoffs have to all be in the direction of the most extreme wing of the House Republican Party. So that process is going to handcuff us right at the beginning. The third point that many of my colleagues have made is that tax cuts do not pay for themselves. You know, dream on. Folks like to say that. It is as though it is magical. They don't pay for themselves. This tax cut will add about $4 trillion to the deficit. What is next? Then we say: Hey, we have got to cut spending. What spending do we have to cut? Healthcare, the ACA premium support. To the Senator from Massachusetts that would mean--and for a family in Vermont--a lot of them will pay 300, 400, 500 bucks more each month. That is on top of the high grocery bill. So the pressure, then, if we have this explosion in the deficit, is to cut spending, and it usually means that veterans are on the block. It means that the low-income folks are on the block. It means that healthcare for working families is on the block. So let's have a tax system that is fair and also promotes growth and invests in the folks who want to work to make this economy strong, who want to build strong communities and take care of their families. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, all of Vermont celebrates the University of Vermont Men's Soccer Team on winning the NCAA Men's Soccer National Championship. The UVM Men's Soccer Team affectionately known as the ``Cardiac Catamounts,'' pulled off a historic comeback on Monday, December 16 to win 2-1 against Marshall University after a 95th minute golden goal, earning their first title in program history and becoming the first team in the America East Conference to win a national championship. It was a game for the record books, literally Marcell Papp's perfectly timed goal gave the Catamounts a golden opportunity in overtime, and Maximilian Kissel's winning goal--his 11th of the season--will be remembered for all time. The entire squad--Niklas Herceg, Lou Liedtka, Nathan Simeon, Mike Bleeker, Cole Richardson, Adrian Schulze Solano, Connor Thompson, Andrew Millar, Niels Hartman, Maximilian Kissel, Nick Lockermann, Yaniv Bazini, Nash Barlow, David Ismail, Ethan Czaporowski, Gianluca Armellino, Ioanis Vassiliou, Marcell Papp, Toby Grant, Karl Daly, Sydney Wathuta, TJ Liquori, Pieter Bultman, Ryan Zellefrow, Zach Barrett, Jeremy Tsang, Max Murray, and Mitchell Ringman--played an important part in this season's success. To the casual observer, the Catamounts may have been the tournament's underdogs or a Cinderella story. But to the team and the Vermonters rooting for them back home, this championship win was not a fluke or a lucky break. It was inevitable. In the 2024 season, the Catamounts scored 22 goals in the 76th minute or later, with the championship equalizing goal being no exception. Late game victories were a habit for the Catamounts this tournament, beating San Diego University in overtime during the third-round match and tying the University of Denver in the dying minutes of the semifinal match to push the game into penalty kicks, where a save from Catamounts goalkeeper Niklas Herceg secured the Catamounts a ticket to the finals. The Cardiac Catamounts is only the third unseeded program to win a championship since the National Collegiate Athletic Association expanded the tournament to 16 seeded teams in 2003. The Cats have shown heart, persistence, and never lost their cool all season, Vermont Values through and through. With this championship, the Catamounts put UVM athletics on display and made all of us proud to cheer for Vermont. I congratulate the University of Vermont Men's Soccer Team for their well-deserved championship win and for representing the values of Vermont. And a special congratulations to the Catamounts' Head Coach Rob Dow and his wife Loren Bowley Dow, who welcomed their second child Russel only weeks ago. This is a team of champions, not underdogs. They have made Vermont very proud.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about the concern everyone in this Chamber has about the jeopardy of disaster assistance to the communities that so desperately need it. We had an agreement. We had an agreement that was reached between House Republicans and Democrats--a bipartisan agreement--here in the Senate. And it was to provide desperately needed disaster relief to citizens who were in the eye of storms in Vermont, in North Carolina, in Iowa, in Texas--$100 million. And what that meant in Vermont was that communities that had put money out to fix culverts, to repair bridges, to realign roads, and who were expecting the money from FEMA in this disaster assistance suddenly are on hold. Will they get it? We don't know at this moment. Farms, where farmers had lost their crops in July of 2023--and we had another flood in July of 2024--and where couples who were running these farms and making existential decisions about whether they could keep farming--and we need them; we need them to be able to keep farming; we need it for Vermont; and we need it to show respect for our farmers-- are awaiting an answer as to whether this disaster relief will come through. This is going to have a huge impact on Vermont. Our property taxpayers who suffer from enormously high property taxes will be pounded if that relief doesn't get back to those communities where they fronted money for that culvert repair, the bridge repair, and road repair; and our small businesses that have been hammered as well and are awaiting an answer on whether they can get relief from the assistance in that program; and homeowners who have been told that they can get money for a buyout because their home was destroyed in a flood--and what a horrible thing for folks to have to go through. A lot of that happened in July of 2023. But then to have to go through the constant uncertainty and bureaucratic delays that have been so rampant in FEMA, and we had this moment where $100 billion was going to be available to help in Vermont and other States where this relief was necessary. And it is not right that after we have this agreement, negotiated on a bipartisan basis, it is pulled out from underneath us. And, by the way, one of the great experiences I have had in the U.S. Senate was working with colleagues--my Republican colleagues like Thom Tillis and like Ted Budd, from North Carolina--whose citizens suffered an enormous loss from what happened in Hurricane Helene. It wiped out bookstores in Asheville, restaurants in Asheville needing help. And it was so gratifying to me to see that all of us, whether we represented folks in a red State or a blue State, whether the constituents who were in need voted for Trump or Harris, it just didn't matter. Our obligation was to help them. And that is a basic responsibility that this Congress has when our citizens, through no fault of their own, suffer enormous economic loss as a result of a natural weather event. We had this agreement. What happened? Literally, we had this agreement. Speaker Johnson signed off on it. Leadership here signed off on it. Mr. Musk sent out a tweet. He didn't like it, and he blew the entire thing up. And how is it that one person can have so much power to destroy something that the American people really need? A $277 million contribution to a campaign gets you a seat at the table--maybe the head seat at the table. And that, flatout, is wrong. The American people--those folks who suffered in Asheville, NC, in Lyndonville, VT-- they are entitled to immediate action. So we don't know what the next few hours are going to be, but what I know is that I will not abandon Vermonters. I will not abandon Americans who are counting on this disaster relief. I am going to hang in there to make certain that I do every single thing I can to help the Vermonters and the North Carolinians and the folks in Iowa and Texas and Louisiana who have been in the path of these terrible storms. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that all postcloture time on the motion to proceed to H.R. 82 be considered expired following the remarks of Senator Lee for up to 30 minutes; further, that following the motion to proceed vote, the Senate proceed to executive session; and further, that the cloture motions with respect to the Cheeks and Murillo nominations ripen at 11 a.m. on Friday, December 20.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Thank you, Senator, I am fully supportive of the work that you have done. Is there anything that gives more pleasure than being able to do something that is generated by our local citizens, the people we represent, that reflects the dedication, the reverence, the appreciation they have for the natural world in your State of Connecticut or now in my State of Vermont? I mean, what a privilege it is for both of us to be here advocating on behalf of these aspirations of the people we represent. I know that is true for the Presiding Officer as well, all the work that you have done. Today, I rise in support of S. 432, the Nulhegan River and Paul Stream Wild and Scenic River Study Act. The bill will initiate the process of designating the Nulhegan River and Paul Stream in Essex County, VT, which is way up in the northeast corner of Vermont that Senator George Aiken named the ``Northeast Kingdom,'' a place that we love and that someday, when you are so lucky that you can come to the Nulhegan River, you will love, too. I was proud to work with my colleagues Senator Sanders and Representative Balint in introducing this legislation, and it was my first act as a U.S. Senator. These two rivers run through Vermont's Northeast Kingdom, as I mentioned, home to some of our State's most scenic parts of a scenic State. It is very close to the annual Moose Festival that I know, Senator, you will enjoy when I finally get you up there to Canaan, VT. But the Nulhegan, for example, passes through the Silvio O. Conte National Wildlife Refuge. It is the only watershed-based refuge in the United States. And by the way, Silvio Conte, as you know, was a Congressman from Western Massachusetts. That is where I grew up, and he did so much-- Republican--to preserve the watershed of the Connecticut River. The Nulhegan, the river, winds through the valleys between hills and, in the fall, is framed by really striking foliage, largely undisturbed by outside visitors. They don't know about it, but now they will. In the spring, the rivers' whitewater provides a unique and challenging place for daring fisherman and paddlers. Healthy rivers, I know we all agree, are really essential to our State's ecosystems, and they play an important role in Vermont's outdoor recreation economy. It is no surprise that the communities neighboring these two rivers support protecting their free-flowing nature too. And that is the point I was making at the beginning. When you have the citizens who are living there and seeing how precious this resource is and wanting to do everything they can to protect that resource and we can help them, that is a good day in the U.S. Senate. S. 432 will preserve these two rivers, enhance Vermont's renowned recreational resources, and conserve these vital habitats. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, I want to thank Senator Durbin for his ongoing commitment to highlighting the plights of people who have been imprisoned for doing nothing more than exercising free speech, for doing nothing more than speaking up on behalf of the oppressed in their own country, for speaking up on behalf of human rights and justice. What Senator Durbin said inspires me, and that is: We don't know what the outcome will be. Is anyone paying attention? We don't know, but what we do know and we have seen is that this does help and make a difference and get some attention on people who were unjustly imprisoned for doing something that is noble. And our goal here is not always to have everything be instrumental immediately, but it is to reassert the commitment that this U.S. Senate has to do what is within our power--sometimes it is very limited, as in this case of advocacy and attention to highlight and hopefully result in the highlighting of an oppressive situation--to have a release of a person who has been unjustly detained. So I just want to express my gratitude to Senator Durbin. And over the years, I have met people who used to be political prisoners and were shaking the hand of Senator Durbin. His advocacy made a difference. The advocacy of other Members of the Senate makes a difference. And the most compelling thing for me is just think about what it is like to be a person who has made a statement, who used Twitter and you are suddenly arrested; you are suddenly cut off from your family; you are suddenly cut off from any visitation; you have no idea whether you have a future. And you have to feel, day in and day out, in that captivity, that people have completely forgotten who you are, that you have become invisible. So the act of trying to make visible people who, as a result of the use of state power, have been made invisible is something that each and every one of us should do our best--using this office that we have and this forum we have--to stand up and remember people who have been made forgotten because they have done decent things. I am really grateful to work with Senator Durbin on this, and I want to focus attention on other political prisoners. The first is Maryia Kalesnikava. Maryia is a professional musician. Think about that--a gifted musician. Think of the discipline that goes into becoming a professional musician. She was admired throughout Belarus for her talents and as a leading member of the political opposition. She left aside just being a musician to speak out on behalf of her people. She called for free and fair elections. Arrest follows. After every leading opposition candidate had either been jailed in Belarus or fled the country, Maryia was apprehended in 2020 by officials driving an unmarked vehicle and taken to the Belarus border, where they attempted to forcibly deport her to Ukraine. She wouldn't allow herself to be forcibly deported. Think about that. She had to risk coming back when she was in the custody of unknown people who had no good intention for her. They put her on trial. She was tried, and she was sentenced to 11 years in a penal colony--11 years--for the crime of calling for free and fair elections. Her situation is obviously concerning for many reasons, not the least of which is that between February 2023 and November 2024--1 year and 9 months--she was not allowed any visits by her family. I mean, just think about that: Your son or your daughter is cut off from you, and you have no idea of how they are doing, whether they are alive, are they suffering. Only after nearly 600 days was Maryia's father finally permitted to visit her last month. Now, I am speaking about this with some passion because I met her sister just recently. Her sister Tatsiana came to my office, and she has been out and about telling her sister's story and seeking for her release. Tatsiana was joined in my office by two human rights defenders who are courageously working to help secure the release of Maryia and other Belarusian political prisoners. There have been a small number of Belarusian prisoners convicted of ``extremism'' who have been released, and I am hopeful that Maryia will also be released. And while the United States and Belarus have profound disagreements, including over human rights and Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine, I believe that officials of both governments should speak respectfully toward each other and seek opportunities to work together to address issues of common interest. My hope is that her release will be one of them. Madam President, secondly, I want to speak about Maykel ``Osorbo'' Castillo. Maykel is an Afro-Cuban musician and writer who won a Latin Grammy Award while imprisoned in a Cuban jail. How do you do that? He won a Latin Grammy while he was in jail. He helped write a hit pro- democracy anthem that won Song of the Year at the 2021 Latin Grammys. One of the things that are so extraordinary about folks like this who are illegally, wrongly imprisoned is that it doesn't somehow quell their spirit to express themselves and their joy of life. Maykel is definitely one of them. He was arrested in May 2021 following months of police harassment, including intensive surveillance, movement restrictions, and ``preventative'' detention. He was sentenced a year later on politically motivated charges of evading police custody and sharing social media critical of the government. Maykel is one of the many who have been unjustly imprisoned, and I urge the Cuban Government to release him. I also hope the incoming Trump administration will not do what many fear, which is to tighten, really, a lot of further sanctions on Cuba even more. Finally, I want to mention Dr. Salah Soltan. Salah is a 65-year-old U.S. permanent resident, academic scholar, and prisoner of conscience in Egypt. Dr. Salah has quite a smile, as you can see. He is a husband, he is a father, and he is a grandfather to 11 grandchildren--American citizens, by the way--with deep roots in Michigan and the Midwest. He has been unjustly imprisoned for 12 years, and he is in fragile health. In recent years, there has been growing bicameral, bipartisan, domestic, regional, and international support for his release on medical and on humanitarian grounds. President Sisi has taken some modest steps towards justice for political prisoners, including removing more than 700 Egyptians with tangential ties to opposition political parties from domestic terrorism lists. That is good, what President Sisi did. We want him and urge him to release Salah on humanitarian grounds so he can rejoin his family in the United States. Madam President, these are only three of the tens and probably hundreds of thousands of prisoners of conscience in the world. The arbitrary arrest and imprisonment of individuals for nothing more than peacefully expressing views in support of democracy, in support of freedom of expression and other human rights, is abhorrent. These folks are accused of all sorts of fabricated charges. And it is really abuse of the awesome power of the state to essentially oppress people who are critical of the state. These folks are apprehended. They are subjected oftentimes to inhumane conditions, often solitary confinement in decrepit prisons, without access to lawyers or families. They are erased. They become invisible, as Senator Durbin was discussing. Some of these folks die in prison from torture or untreated medical conditions. So anytime we can raise the possibility of their getting some attention so their case can be heard, so they have some possibility of release, is a good use of our time. The question about why we do it kind of surprises me, actually, because the answer is simple. Americans care about people whose fundamental rights are denied, and whoever and wherever they are, we should continue to express that concern. I am proud to say that certainly is a legacy of my predecessor, Senator Patrick Leahy, who served in this body for 48 years. In fact, that right is every person's responsibility under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which no country voted against when it was adopted on December 10, 1948--66 years ago today. I want to finish where I started by thanking my colleague from Illinois not just for his advocacy but for his inspiration to all of us to do what we can with this office that we hold for whatever period of time we have been entrusted to speak out on behalf of wonderful people like the people I mentioned and Senator Durbin mentioned. I yield to my colleague Senator Durbin.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, if the 118th Congress were a baseball game, we would be nearing the bottom of the ninth. As every Senator is well aware, our to-do list for the next 2 weeks is long. There are very important issues we need to resolve before the last vote of the year. We need to keep the government open. We need to extend the farm bill and vote on the NDAA. And critically for Vermont and for so many States around the Nation, we must pass the comprehensive disaster aid package. Legislating is a team sport. If we work together and find common ground, we can send a bill to the President's desk before the end of Congress and deliver for those communities that desperately, desperately need action from the U.S. Senate. Despite our differences, whether they are political or geographic, communities from Montpelier, VT, to Mankato, MN; from Houston, TX, to Asheville, NC, to Maui, HI, are all asking for Congress to help with the devastation that has happened in those communities. For months, bipartisan Members of Congress from States that have been affected by floods, fires, hurricanes, and tornadoes have approached our colleagues in the time of our need. We have asked publicly and privately for the assistance and financial support that our homeowners need, our farmers need, and businesses, towns, and local governments urgently need, because when it comes to these extreme weather events, we all know that if it is not us now, it may be us tomorrow, because there but for the grace of God, go I, when the extreme weather events decide to descend upon any community. I found in the conversations I have had with my colleagues-- Republican and Democrat--about Vermont's recovery needs, there is an unspoken acknowledgement that they are not in the Vermont situation or in the Asheville, NC, situation, but it could change. The climate change that we are experiencing all around the country requires that, No. 1, we be ready to respond; two, we be more resilient and prepared; and, three, that we have better funded responses to recovery so that it can be faster, locally driven, and more efficient. In July of 2023, Vermont experienced torrential rains and severe storms. For a week, the rain didn't stop. That rain quickly led to catastrophic flooding and landslides. Many homes, many of our farms and businesses and communities were absolutely destroyed, and the damage to infrastructure was fierce. Roads, rail lines, dams, bridges, wastewater plants, the capital city's post office, which after 14 months finally reopened, those were destroyed. Nine States around Vermont came to our aid, and we are grateful. They sent personnel. They sent resources. But a year after that flood, in July-- to the same date in July--we had another round of flooding, and many of those same homes and businesses and farms were impacted. The last time Congress passed a comprehensive disaster aid package was December of 2022. Since then, we have had more than 50 climate disasters around our country that each caused more than $1 billion in damages--a total of $155 billion in damages and rising. We know that that number is only going to grow when we have the final losses from Hurricane Milton and Hurricane Helene, and they are continuing to be calculated. This is an environmental and an economic disaster. These disasters have impacted communities from Vermont to North Carolina, to Minnesota, to Texas and Hawaii, and more than 40 States and Territories total. As we all know, extreme weather does not discriminate based on State lines or political preferences. In a crisis, we are all neighbors in need. Since Congress last passed a comprehensive disaster aid bill--this is just to give a sense of how repetitive this is and how what had been an outlier event is now becoming a common event in different places around our country--these are disasters that have happened: Flooding in North Dakota between April and May of 2023. Flooding near West Point and the Hudson Valley area of New York in 2023. Hurricane Helene caused damage across Georgia and South Carolina in September of 2024. Flooding in 2023 in Central California, with enormous damage in the Central Valley. Hurricane Milton slammed Florida in October of 2024. Southeastern Iowa saw devastating tornadoes in 2024. Tornadoes and severe storms hit Nebraska in April and June of this year. And 110 tornadoes ripped across Missouri, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Illinois, and Kentucky in May, killing 16. And more than 40 tornadoes caused damage across Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee in March of 2023. These events are all too common, and they are going to accelerate, not diminish. So we do need to fund FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund, and we need to do that for the benefit of all Americans. We need to provide those farmers and producers and ranchers with dedicated recovery assistance to help them with their losses so they can farm and ranch again. We need to get our communities the flexible funding--and I emphasize ``flexible'' and locally driven funding--that they need through programs like the community development block grant disaster recovery funding, something that Senator Schatz from Hawaii has been leading on. We need to rebuild our infrastructure. We have to reimburse our States, whose budgets have been hammered, and reimburse our communities that have spent big to get folks back on safe roads. We need to fix our wastewater and drinking water systems for the health and well-being of our citizens. And we have to help those small businesses. That aid has to come sooner rather than later. The delay has already been really brutal on their ability to keep the lights on. The longer we wait to help disaster victims, the more disaster victims we will have. The list of needs will only grow. Delay hurts. It doesn't help. That is why I am asking my colleagues in the Senate and in the House to act now and act quickly for Vermont and for every State hit by a disaster since we last passed a disaster bill so many storms ago. We cannot wait. As I said, we have common ground in our common crisis. We must send a disaster bill to President Biden's desk. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, Donald H. Turner, Jr., epitomized public service. Don grew up in Milton, VT, a town of less than 11,000 people. When he was a boy, it had half that number. Don's family owned the local bowling alley and a construction company. His family's outsized presence in the town may be why he saw the entire community as family. Don signed up as a volunteer firefighter at 16 and remained involved with the department for his entire life, serving 14 years as chief. On my last visit to Milton in March 2023, we discussed the challenges facing small fire departments and rescue squads, input that directly influenced legislation I introduced to reimburse emergency medical services providers for care they provide patients who are not transported to a hospital. For the past 7 years, Don served as town manager in his hometown. If the rescue squad was short a person to respond to a call, he would leave his office and hop in the ambulance. Prior to serving in town government, Don represented his community in the Vermont House of Representatives for 13 years, including 8 as the minority leader. Perhaps that is why when he assumed leadership of his hometown government, he made his and the town staff's motto, ``Get stuff done.'' And he did. A new town garage, something in the works before the birth of the town's current selectboard chair, was wrapped up in 2 years under Don's leadership. It is now named for him, with ``Getting stuff done'' written in large letters along one wall. He also kept up the pressure on a transformative road project for the town, working through multiple issues to get the project underway in the past year. Infrastructure is the most basic part of a town manager's job. Don went beyond that. A lifelong Republican, he led efforts in the town to examine its practices and policies with an eye toward making sure they were fair and allowed everyone to participate. This led to changes in the town's recreation department, where Don wanted to remove barriers to participation, including income or disabilities that might previously have kept children and adults on the sidelines. He championed an annual inclusion festival, in which he was an eager and proud participant. In 2019, the Milton Public Library hosted a drag queen story time. When the event drew backlash, Don defended the library, attended the event, and had his photo taken with the drag queens. When the tree topper was damaged ahead of the annual holiday tree lighting, Don made a new one in his garage. No business in town was too small to receive Don's support. If there was a ribbon to be cut or a grand opening that needed attendees, he was there, regardless of the day or time. When the high school needed someone to transport supplies for an event, Don pulled up in his truck. His dedication to his town earned him the nickname ``Mr. Milton.'' Don believed that, ``If you look after people, they will look after you.'' He lived that belief, setting an example, not only for his community, but for all of us who are committed to public service. He passed away on Saturday, November 30, after a brief battle with cancer. Don was 60 years old. Margaret and I extend our condolences to his wife Gail and his daughters Emily, Hillary, and Erin, as well as their families and loved ones. And I also give comfort to the Milton community, who lost a neighbor, friend, and important member of their community. Donald H. Turner, Jr., will be missed by many in Vermont.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, world leaders and other high-ranking officials from nearly 200 countries have been in Baku, Azerbaijan, this week in pursuit of an agreement on financing of future actions necessary to avert a global catastrophe caused by climate change. The outcome of these negotiations will signal whether the international community is finally getting serious about reducing carbon emissions to halt global warming--or still capable only of setting inadequate, voluntary goals, which they then fail to meet. It is sadly ironic that the 29th Conference of the Parties, otherwise known as COP29, is being held in an oil-rich country that has wholly failed to meet its commitments under the Paris Agreement, and whose head of state, President Ilham Aliyev, has profited from his county's oil wealth. Aliyev has abused his authority, enriching himself and crushing any opposition to his authoritarian rule. In fact, Aliyev opened COP29 by praising fossil fuels as a ``gift from God'' and, in the run-up to the conference, penned several natural gas deals, boosting the fossil fuel industry in his country. It is also distressing that rather than invest in clean energy, President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to do everything he can to increase the production of fossil fuels here in the United States and has threatened to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement. The result for the American people would be dirtier air, dirtier water, more disastrous oil and chemical spills, and more hurricanes, floods, droughts, fires, earthquakes, and other extreme weather events that have devastated communities across this country. This year, another 40 billion tons of heat-trapping carbon will be spewed into the Earth's atmosphere. That is nearly double the emissions compared to just 25 years ago, despite the repeated warnings of the world's scientists of the harmful impacts on human health and the environment. Madam President, 2024 is expected to be the first full year when we have breached the 1.5-degree Celsius target set in Paris, with temperatures reaching life-threating levels for hundreds of millions of people. Wildfires are more frequent and intense than ever before. Water has become so scarce in some countries plagued by prolonged drought that it is more valuable than oil. Deforestation, another driver of global warming, is causing the extinction of an estimated 137 species of plants, animals, and insects every day. That is 50,000 species lost forever each year. Economically, the story is no better. A recent working paper of the National Bureau of Economic Research estimates that for every additional degree of global warming, we can expect a 12 percent drop in global GDP. That translates to increasing costs for food, housing, clothing, transportation, and other basic needs. To illustrate the global scope of climate change, both Vermont and Vietnam, on opposite sides of the planet, experienced catastrophic flooding this year. But they were not alone. This year has brought unprecedented flooding from torrential rainfall, hurricanes, and typhoons causing death and destruction on a massive scale in the United States, Central Asia, East Africa, West Africa, Southeast Asia, and Central Europe. Despite this ominous trend, the response of the Republican-led House of Representatives was to prohibit a U.S. contribution to the Green Climate Fund in fiscal year 2025. The House included zero funding for the UN Environment Program, zero funding for USAID's clean energy programs, zero funding for USAID's climate adaptation programs, and they cut funding for USAID's programs to protect forests and wildlife. President-elect Trump's designated czar for so-called government efficiency has proposed to cut the Federal budget by $2 trillion. The consequences of cuts for programs to combat global warming worldwide, combined with increased investments in fossil fuels, would threaten future generations with potentially catastrophic increases in temperatures and sea levels unprecedented in human history. If President-elect Trump and the Republican Congress get their way, it is the American people who will suffer. Climate change is a global crisis, requiring global solutions. The United States has the opportunity and obligation to be the world's leader on climate, not just because we are the second largest producer of greenhouse gas emissions, but because we have the world's strongest economy and the power to drive innovation. Taking a back seat in addressing climate change will undercut our economic competitiveness and cede ground to China and other industrialized nations. And while the President-elect may seek to reverse the progress we have made in recent years, the American people understand that climate change is real. They are already coping with the impacts, which are becoming worse each year. I, and many others in the Senate, remain committed to working to transition away from fossil fuels, protect clean air and water, support vulnerable communities, and preserve biodiversity. We will continue to do all we can to ensure the United States does its part. Unfortunately, at COP29, we are witnessing what an absence of strong U.S. leadership looks like. Argentina has withdrawn its delegation and, following in the President-elect's footsteps, is reconsidering its participation in the Paris Agreement. The heads of state of China, France, Germany, Japan, and India declined to attend. In fact, the top leaders of the 13 largest carbon emitters, including the U.S., are absent. International cooperation must go on. COP29 must reaffirm, despite the ebbs and flows of electoral politics, that there is still an international commitment to address the climate crisis. A recent UN report on the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement showed them falling woefully short of what is needed to avert what UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell described as a ``human and economic train wreck for every country, without exception.'' New NDCs, which will outline parties' efforts to lower emissions through 2035, are due in February of next year and must be ambitious, substantive, and actionable to avoid an economic and human catastrophe. In another measure of our collective ambitions, negotiators in Baku will set a new climate finance goal to replace the $100 billion annual contributions pledged by developed countries to fund climate actions in developing nations. Experts have estimated that the need for financial assistance will exceed $1 trillion annually by 2035. While countries have balked at this figure, direct fossil fuel subsidies reached $1.3 trillion in 2022, according to the International Monetary Fund. Negotiators must increase public contributions by several orders of magnitude--hundreds of billions of dollars--in order to successfully leverage private finance if we hope to achieve this goal. COP29 will also seek to implement article 6 of the Paris Agreement, which allows countries to trade emission reductions, by establishing rules for international carbon markets. Any markets emerging from these negotiations must be transparent, include strong environmental guardrails, and be strictly enforced. They must account for the full lifecycle of carbon emissions, a range of conservation actions, and the unique natural resources of countries across the world. Carbon markets cannot be allowed to ``greenwash'' or ``offset'' continued emissions by polluters, but facilitate real, lasting change in our global energy systems. Finally, we must use COP29 as an opportunity to continue building momentum in the effort to limit the climate crisis. While we need to do more, we have made positive strides in recent years. The President's Emergency Plan for Adaptation and Resilience has mobilized billions of dollars to help developing countries manage the effects of global warming, reducing the risk of climate-fueled conflict and migration. Policies to strengthen the renewable energy sector have made renewables the cheapest electricity on the market, lowering the energy cost burden for consumers. Investments in green manufacturing will produce hundreds of thousands of new, good-paying, American jobs. Climate action is not only good for the environment, but also for our economy, public health, and national security. COP29 must remind us of these facts and inspire action. Climate change is an existential threat that may soon dwarf all others we face. The 2050 deadline for climate action is only 25 years away. We are no longer talking about future generations; it is our generation that will have to contend with a climate that is increasingly hostile. The clock is running out. There is no more time to waste.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. First of all, I want to thank the majority leader not only for his leadership on this issue in his straightforward, direct embrace of the cause of Israel but also your openness for a debate in the Senate about what is the best pathway forward. Madam President, I also want to acknowledge that I had to listen carefully to the words of Senator Schumer, Senator Rosen, Senator Budd. They have given eloquent arguments in favor of opposing this resolution. They raised the questions I ask myself: Can I, as a U.S. Senator who is a strong supporter of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state; can I, as a U.S. Senator who is absolutely appalled at what Hamas did on October 7; can I, as a U.S. Senator who attended a presentation by the Israeli Embassy that displayed the horror of the rapes and the assaults on women who were taken captive; and can I, as a U.S. Senator who believes in a two-state solution, vote in favor of stopping the delivery of offensive weapons for Israel to use in Gaza? And my answer is yes. It is for two reasons. First, we are into our 14th month in Gaza. And what has happened is over 43,000 people have been killed. Many Hamas, including the Hamas leadership, have been killed. Good riddance. But many, many thousands of innocent Palestinians, including women and children, have been killed. Over 100,000 have been maimed and injured, and 60 to 70 percent of the structures in Gaza have been destroyed. That includes the schools. Young Gazans have not been in school for 14 months. Hospitals have been destroyed. The humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza is unparalleled and is being inflicted on innocent Palestinians. There is a second reason that I am going to support the joint resolutions. I believe the continuation of the military action in Gaza is not only jeopardizing what hostages still are alive, but it can only make Israel weaker, not stronger. Their own recently fired Defense Minister said there is no further military purpose of offensive action in Gaza. If there is no further reason for offensive military action in Gaza, why is there a need for the United States to be providing more offensive weapons for the Netanyahu government to be used in Gaza? That is the question we face. We talk about the signals that will be sent to Hamas, to Iran, to Israel. There is another reality that can't be escaped, and it isn't answered by inquiring as to what ``signals'' are being sent. It is what is going to happen to these kids. What is going to happen to these families that are continuing to live under bombardment where they can't be safe anywhere, in part, because Hamas will go anywhere they can to try to use them as human shields. But even without that--being told that they can be safe here but then are bombed and being told they can be safe there--many of these families have been dislocated six to seven times. The humanitarian catastrophe is grinding on. It comes, of course, at a cost--enormous cost--to Palestinian families. It has come at a cost to the State of Israel--which we support--with their further isolation in the international community. So the question before us is: What is the right thing to do, not just by way of limiting and helping humanitarian catastrophe, but what is the right thing for the United States to do with its ally Israel in pursuit of the two goals we have always had with Israel? And that is to advocate and defend and support Israel as a democratic, secure Jewish State. And because we believe this is important to make that happen, that we have an independent, secure Palestinian State, a two-state solution. So the question that I have is, Will U.S. arms, to be used offensively in Gaza at this time and with this government, enhance American policy that has been the policy of the United States through Republican and Democratic administrations? Madam President, the answer I have come to, the judgment I have come to as a U.S. Senator is that it would harm our goals for that Jewish democratic state, for the easing of humanitarian suffering, for compliance with international law and the Leahy Law, and for what is a goal that has to be the touchstone of our policy, and that is doing everything we can to achieve a two-state solution for a secure, democratic, independent Israel and a secure, disarmed--not armed-- Palestinian State side by side. I intend to support these resolutions. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, I just want to add my voice of support. Why do we need a farm bill? Because we need farmers, and we need food. And one of the wonderful things about our farmers is they do a job that is incredibly hard to do. It is a job that is filled with uncertainty. What is the weather going to be today? What are the prices on the futures market tomorrow? What is going to happen in our neighborhood? It is incredibly uncertain, but the farmers love the work. And who among us works harder than farmers? Maybe coal miners, but not many more. So they stand for hard work and feeding America. The second thing is farmers need stability because they have no control over things that profoundly affect them. But the other thing is farmers actually are the custodians of our landscape. And they, in all of our communities--whether it is dairy, say, in Vermont, or it might be wheat or corn in Illinois, or cherries in Michigan--they are providing a benefit to all of us who are not farmers and can't take on the courage they have to do that work. And on the conservation title, I have talked to a lot of farmers in Vermont. They are so appreciative that, in addition to feeding us with nutritious food, they have a chance to actually get some income to help us conserve the land. That is a good thing because that is another income stream for the farmers. So this should not be a fight among opposing sides. What do we have to do to provide stability to farmers? They have to get a fair price for their crop. And then, if they are going to make contributions on the whole issue of conservation in reducing carbon emissions, they have to get some income for that. And that is in the farm bill. So let's pass the farm bill because we need farmers, we need food, and we need a clean and healthy environment. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to complete my remarks prior to the scheduled vote.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, the United States must continue to support the people of Ukraine as they continue to defend their country from Russia's invasion. The support provided by the United States has been indispensable in thwarting Russia's advances, but Ukraine needs continued assurances today--and tomorrow--that this support will continue. There will be policy shifts in the next Congress and with the next administration, but we can't abandon our fundamental support for Ukraine. Doing so would be existential for the Ukrainian people, dangerous for Europe, and dangerous for the United States. Allowing a large country to invade its smaller, neighboring country with impunity clears a path for authoritarian leaders with similar aspirations, and it sends the message that these actions are acceptable. Left unchecked, these violent actions threaten America's partners and allies. We are at an inflection point. The President-elect has praised Vladimir Putin, the man waging an unjust war against Ukraine, for being a strong leader. He called him a ``genius'' and ``savvy'' and said: I got along with him great. He liked me. I liked him. I struggle to find common ground or agreement with someone who gets along with one of America's most ruthless adversaries. But I hope we can all agree that America's security is inseparable from the security of Europe. Republicans and Democrats alike have always recognized that, and I want to pay tribute to many of my Republican colleagues for their stalwart continuation of support for Ukraine to defend itself. We must all stand up against a brutal authoritarian who has sparked a war that has killed and wounded 1 million people and displaced millions more, killed dissidents, stolen children, and imprisoned journalists, civil rights advocates, and political opponents. If the United States were to withdraw our support from Ukraine, the consequences would be severe and exactly what Russia wants. The Ukrainian people are doing their part. They are fighting to defend their territory and Ukraine's sovereignty with every ounce of strength, in every part of Ukraine. And they have fought back against Russian aggression since 2014, when Russia invaded and annexed Crimea. The Ukrainian people have been steadfast and resilient in protecting their land, their culture, and their heritage. But Ukraine isn't only fighting. They are also reforming and strengthening their country there. Since 2014, Ukraine has adopted anti-corruption reforms and continues to advance its efforts, including strengthening Ukraine's Constitutional Court and judicial reforms and cracking down on unauthorized trade. To date--this is really good news--there have been no credible allegations of corruption associated with international donor support. And, in the midst of this brutal war, Ukraine's economy is tenaciously strong. Despite the war, Ukraine's GDP growth is reportedly up 5 percent from last year. Since September, more than 60 million tons of grain and steel have been sent to the global market through the Black Sea. The World Bank and others are developing investment plans to rebuild energy, manufacturing, and agricultural infrastructure--a reconstruction for Ukraine that will cost nearly $500 billion. We must be firm in our military, economic, and humanitarian assistance for Ukraine and equally unequivocal in imposing consequences for Russia's aggression. United States, European, and global support for Ukraine must continue. As Penny Pritzker, former Special Representative for Ukraine's Economic Recovery at the Department of State and former Secretary of Commerce under President Obama, has said, ``military assistance alone is not enough. We must match a hardened security umbrella with a comprehensive economic recovery framework.'' I could not agree more. Putin has brought war back to Europe. Putin's imperialist invasion has brought back memories of World War II. If the United States had not stayed the course to defend Europe against the Nazis, our world would look very much different today. The world needs a multilateral court to prosecute the crime of aggression. Sanctions must continue, and the international community must seek reparation and compensation for the victims of Putin's violence, the return of Ukrainian children to their homes and families, and the proper registration of damage that has been caused by Russia's aggression against Ukraine. We should also give Ukraine the flexibility it needs to use U.S.- provided weapons effectively against Russian military targets. Many European countries have already done so, and it would empower Ukraine to blunt the Russian attack and put Russian forces on the defensive. Madam President, Putin's plan to isolate and erase Ukraine has backfired. There are more joint security commitments between the European Union and Ukraine than ever before. Finland and Sweden have joined NATO, strengthening our defense alliance. The European Union and member states have increased their support for Ukraine in military equipment, economic and humanitarian support, refugee assistance, and so many other aspects of resilience and defense. The whole world is watching the Ukrainians fight to defend our common values, our fundamental freedoms, and the rule of law. The world is also watching us. We are leaders, and we must remain leaders. We are not naive to the challenges ahead for Ukraine, but if we walk away now, we may seal Ukraine's fate. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume executive session and resume consideration of the Perry nomination.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, last December I joined Senators Tim Kaine, Dick Durbin, Jeff Merkley, and Laphonza Butler and Representatives Norma J. Torres and Delia C. Ramirez, on a trip to Guatemala. We arrived just weeks before the scheduled inauguration of President Bernardo Arevalo, who had been elected by an overwhelming majority. The Guatemalan people had voted decisively to reject the corruption, impunity, and malfeasance that had been the hallmark of successive governments in that country. We went to Guatemala to speak directly to Mr. Arevalo's supporters, as well as to the powerful forces in Guatemala, including the Attorney General, opposition members of Congress, magistrates, and those who were corruptly conspiring to prevent President Arevalo from taking office. Our purpose was to make clear that if their efforts to subvert the will of the people succeeded, it would have profoundly negative long-term consequences for U.S. relations--both economic and security-- for whoever illegally seized power. It would propel the country down a path of authoritarianism and economic decline much like Nicaragua, leading to further social division, political instability, and isolation Their efforts to overturn the election and undermine the people were flagrant; the Attorney General went so far as to attempt to nullify the fair election of then President-elect Arevalo shortly after we met with officials of the outgoing administration to urge a peaceful transfer of power. Ultimately, the efforts to prevent President Arevalo from taking office failed. But his detractors were far from defeated. They immediately set their sights on preventing President Arevalo from carrying out his anti-corruption agenda and forcing him from office. Those efforts continue today. I mention this because I recently met with a delegation of Guatemalan indigenous women, led by Nobel Laureate Rigoberta Menchu. Although their numbers are woefully under-represented in the three branches of government, I have never met more determined and courageous women. Women who have experienced extreme poverty, violence, and loss, yet who have become leaders in their communities and fiercely dedicated to preserving their indigenous identity, improving the lives of their families, and defending Guatemala's fragile democracy. The United States strongly supports President Arevalo, who offers the best chance Guatemala has had in decades to chart a new path for his country--a path grounded in the rule of law, in the institutions of democracy, in transparency, in accountability. And despite the efforts of the corrupt networks whose only interest is in using the institutions of power and privilege to enrich themselves, I am hopeful because President Arevalo has the support of Guatemala's indigenous population, exemplified by the fearless women I met this week. They are not going to let what they won freely and fairly at the ballot box be stolen from them. They are not going to allow a minority of crooked elites deny them and their children the chance for a better life. They have an ambitious social, economic, and political reform agenda. They are committed to working to strengthen education, economic opportunity, equality, democracy, and justice. It is in the interest of the Arevalo administration and the United States to help them achieve these goals for the benefit of all Guatemalans.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, climate change, as we all know, has caused major disasters all across America, from Vermont's catastrophic flooding in July of 2023 and, again, exactly a year later, this past July, to the devastating wildfires in Hawaii, to hurricanes in Texas, floods in San Diego and southern Minnesota, tornadoes from Mississippi to New York. And just this week, Louisiana was hit by a hurricane, and North Carolina was hit by historic flash flooding. And North Carolina, earlier this week, saw 18--18--inches of rain in 12 hours, what the National Weather Service in Wilmington called a once-in-a-1,000-year event. That is not normal. From 2023 to 2024, there were 48 climate disasters that incurred losses of billions of dollars and more. These events were devastating for the communities: many demolished homes and businesses, washed away roads, destroyed fields and barns, and loss of life. And while we can count 48 from NOAA today, we know that this list will only grow as storm damage is assessed from Vermont and Louisiana and North Carolina. Disasters literally from coast to coast hit the United States--35 severe storms; 4 floods, including Vermont's flooding; 3 tropical cyclones; 3 winter storms; 2 wildfire events; and 1 drought. This is just going on and on and on, and it is not even the full picture. We have had 125 from the same period. I have shared the pain and anguish of Vermont's homeowners, farms, and businesses. For over 430 days, they have waited for Congress to act when it comes to supplemental relief for the Disaster Relief Fund. Vermonters need that help, as do folks in Hawaii, as do folks in North Carolina. There is bipartisan support for this effort because it is obviously a bipartisan crisis. These weather events don't have any favorites. Whether you are in a red State or a blue State means nothing; it is the weather, and it will do what the weather decides to do. This week, I joined with Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii and our colleagues from Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, California, and Alaska in sending a letter to Senate leadership urging them to quickly pass disaster funding so our States can recover. We have a solid bipartisan group, and regrettably it is a growing group. The need is immense. So we do need more financial support immediately through FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund. It is depleted, and it needs to be replenished. One critically important program for long-term disaster recovery is through our Department of Transportation's disaster relief program. Senator Sanders and I have seen the damage in Vermont. We have suffered brutal damage to our transit system. More than 6,000 tons of debris were removed by the State of Vermont, 409 miles of rail have been closed, 149 miles of rail trail closed, 64 bridges in Vermont closed, and 46 State roads were closed. As of last fall, Vermont incurred $150 million in damages related to transportation alone. And then more flooding came. Both Senator Sanders and I have traveled across Vermont to talk with community leaders about the financial stress they face right now. We have also talked with my colleagues about the needs of our community leaders in their States and their needs as they rebuild and recover and plan for the next climate disaster. The reality is, the numbers don't paint the full picture. We do need that relief to get people moving ahead. But when your town and your street and your home and your lives, the lives of the people you represent, are so devastated, you really can't articulate a number. It doesn't capture it. We need the Disaster Relief Fund replenished. We need transportation funding to reimburse our State governments for the costs they pay up front when a disaster hits. We need more money for the highway emergency fund. Our need is extreme. Our States and communities cannot do this alone, and that is no less true for every other colleague's State than it is for Vermont. Today, I would also like to voice Vermonters' continued frustration-- this is on a slightly different topic but related to the flooding--that 14 months after our post office was destroyed in Montpelier, the capital of the State of Vermont, we still don't have a fully functional post office. After the July 23 floods, the Postal Service shifted its Montpelier Post Office operations to a series of temporary locations, and that included parked trucks miles away from where the old post office was. These were unsafe for the Postal Service workers, and they failed to ensure anything close to reliable service. There was no air- conditioning in the summer months or heat in the fall and no lighting. People literally were using like their iPhones to try to read what the labels were. That is unacceptable. After a public outcry and demands from Senator Sanders and me and our congressional colleague, Congresswomen Balint, the UPS moved postal operations to another temporary location. We thought that was progress when the Postal Service signed the new lease downtown in April, and they said it would be open by summer. It is September. The location is still not open, and, reportedly, little progress has been made. The capital city of the State of Vermont has not had a functioning post office for over a year. It is not a distinction we value. You know, the Postal Service has an internal benchmark of restoring retail service within 180 days of a natural disaster. They are now 256 days overdue. This failure is real and has very practical impacts on our constituents. Right now, Vermonters who live in Montpelier have to drive 7 miles if they want to buy a stamp or mail a package, and it is obviously very burdensome for our businesses. The U.S. Postal Service and the Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy--let me be frank. They have really failed to deliver. And it is shocking to me, but we have had instances where Senator Sanders and I and Congresswoman Balint have tried to interact with the Postal Service, and he is silent, nonresponsive. That is really an insult to the people of Vermont when they need this and can't even get an answer about what is going on. So this is not your standard, run-of-the-mill management failure of the USPS. No. This is really a dereliction of duty, in my view, by Postmaster General DeJoy. He is choosing not to open a post office--a task his Agency has done thousands of times quickly in their 250-year history. While the Postal Service may be independent, it is not without oversight. It does not have the authority to disregard the input of the public who so needs the services or congressional representatives, and it does not have the authority to act contrary to its statutory obligations. I want to close by saying again that I stand ready and willing to work with any of my colleagues to get this disaster relief done. We cannot recover or rebuild without the Federal assistance that all of us in every State that has had a catastrophe, a weather event. We need the help, and we all have to help one another, not only for Vermont but for every community that needs help and will need help in the future. Madam President, you know we can get this done. We have done it before for our constituents. But the delay is going on too long. It is that simple. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, over the past 6 years, my office, and the office of my predecessor Senator Leahy, have received reports of recurring threats, attacks, arbitrary arrests, and assassinations of members of the Guapinol, Tocoa, and other communities in the Bajo Aguan region of Honduras. Those crimes were intended to intimidate and silence those who opposed an open-pit iron oxide mine and the Ecotek Thermoelectric Project which threaten their livelihoods and the region's environment and who challenged the companies and corrupt officials who profit from those projects. Then on Saturday, September 14, I learned of the murder of Honduran environmental activist Juan Lopez, the latest victim of this epidemic of vigilante violence. Mr. Lopez, a winner of the Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Award in 2019, had been a victim of wrongful imprisonment, false prosecution, and had spoken out against corrupt officials in Tocoa. This outrageous crime struck a nerve for me because Mr. Lopez's murder was the latest in a pattern of similar killings. There have been six other assassinations of members of the Guapinol water defenders. No one has been prosecuted or punished for those crimes or for the murders of scores of other environmental and human rights defenders in Honduras. Juan Lopez, like Berta Caceres--whose murder in 2016 was linked to officers of the company responsible for the hydroelectric project she and others in her indigenous community opposed--was a person of integrity. Both were courageous defenders of the environment and their communities, threatened by powerful interests supported by the corrupt Honduran Government of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez who, throughout that period and until his arrest and conviction for drug trafficking, was supported by the United States. Mr. Lopez was killed after the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) issued precautionary measures in October 2023. The issuance of an IACHR protective measure is a mechanism to insist that the Honduran Government protect individuals who are at severe and urgent risk of irreparable harm to their rights to life and safety. But the Honduran Government failed to implement effective protective measures on behalf of these communities or their advocates like Mr. Lopez. Such measures, if not enforced, are no better than the paper they are printed on. And that is the reality in Honduras, where people like Juan Lopez have had no one and nothing to protect them. Instead, it is the victims, the activists, who are arbitrarily arrested and imprisoned, accused of crimes which in reality amount to nothing more than peacefully defending their land and their right to a healthy environment. Some have languished in pre-trial detention for years, for simply protesting a mine that has polluted the water source of thousands of people. Honduras is currently a member of the United Nations Human Rights Council. Members of the council have a responsibility to uphold human rights standards. That has been a criterion of membership since the council was established in 2006. Yet the human rights of people like Juan Lopez and the other Guapinol water defenders are routinely violated with impunity. My thoughts and condolences are with Mr. Lopez's family and with the other families in the Bajo Aguan communities. In response to this pattern of violence and the assassination of Mr. Lopez last Saturday, I believe that, at a minimum, three things need to be done, beginning immediately, and I urge the U.S. Ambassador to Honduras to insist on them as well: an international commission of experts to support the Honduran prosecutor's investigation of the murder of Juan Lopez, to ensure the investigation is credible, thorough, and impartial; protection for human rights defenders at risk in the Bajo Aguan region; and investigations of the abuses and corruption denounced by Juan Lopez and the pattern of violence against the Guapinol defenders. The threats, false arrests, wrongful imprisonment, murder, and impunity in the Bajo Aguan have been tolerated--and in effect tacitly and even actively encouraged--by Honduran officials for far too long. It has also received far too little attention from the United States and other governments that have put the interests of foreign investors above those of the impoverished people who live in that troubled region. I hope that Juan Lopez's death will not only be answered by holding accountable those responsible, but that it will also mark the beginning of real change in the Bajo Aguan. The people of those communities should not have to live in fear that powerful companies and corrupt officials will steal their land, pollute their rivers, and murder them for peacefully defending the natural resources that are rightfully theirs.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, today I celebrate Rachel Gilbert Hopkins, a dedicated Vermonter who has worked to improve our State's adoption system and connect children to a loving family. Vermont's team within the Department for Children and Families, Family Services Division (FSD) is critically important and does life- changing work every day for children in need. Rachel Gilbert Hopkins, or ``Gillie'' as she is known by all, has made an incredible impact. As codirector of Project Family, a partnership between Lund and DCF, Gillie has overseen the completion of more than 2,260 adoptions, advancing child welfare and permanency in our State and changing the lives of children and families. For this reason alone, she is an excellent nominee for the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute's Angels in Adoption honor. But it is also Gillie's far-reaching impact beyond adoption and permanency that has inspired this honor, and at the recommendation of her friends and peers who have witnessed her dedication, I submit her name and this honor to the Record today. As her peers say, Gillie has an ``unwavering commitment to prioritizing the best interests of every child.'' She conducts trainings to empower her colleagues with the tools to advocate for children. She also works with the regional offices and the judiciary to address the barriers to permanency, using research to establish procedures that cultivate efficiency and smoother processes. Gillie has created inclusive spaces, groups, and supportive environments for people to live authentically and has worked on actions that enhance adoption competence among FSD staff. Gillie Hopkins is champion for children, families, and Vermont communities and is well-deserving of the Angels in Adoption honor because of her extraordinary work and dedicated commitment to our State.

Mr. WELCH

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

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Madam President, I have come to the Senate floor time and again and said to my colleagues that disaster relief funding is absolutely urgently needed. Today, the future of government funding is imperiled right now in the House, and the future of disaster funding is still unknown in the Senate. And let me be clear, there are families across America, in Vermont, and in communities impacted by natural disasters all across our country that need us to help, and they can't recover without us. FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund is running out of money, forcing FEMA to function on what is essentially reserve funding. This is no fault of FEMA's. It is all a result of the catastrophic weather events that have been occurring rapidly, frequently, throughout our country and in Vermont. This past year and a half has brought brutal floods in Vermont and terrible fires, hurricanes, and tornadoes across our country. Louisiana right now is bracing for the worst as Hurricane Francine moves onshore, and our prayers in Vermont are with the people of Louisiana. We know their heartbreak and their pain right now. These communities--and it is especially the case with rural communities--cannot weather these storms alone. Some of those that are hardest hit are being financially destroyed. It is a function of the effects of climate change, and those communities don't have the resources to dig out, make repairs, and rebuild in the resilient way required for the future. They can't handle a 100-year flood, and many in Vermont have had two 100-year floods in a year, in some towns even three in 12 or 13 months. It is very important that disaster aid be flexible. We can't expect our communities--and it is from Vermont to Mississippi to Hawaii--we can't expect that those who are ravaged by disaster to fight this fight alone. The entire country has been hammered by climate change and by these weather events. We need, in addition to the supplemental funding for the Disaster Relief Fund for FEMA, we need flexible funding which is available through the Housing and Urban Development's Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery Program. The CDBGDR Program is a great example of how aid can be controlled by communities because there is so much more flexibility with that fund. Our Senator Schatz of Hawaii, as chair of our Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, is leading the push for this funding, and I join him in that effort. Also, the experience I have had visiting communities, visiting farms, visiting businesses, and visiting Vermont homeowners immediately following our State's flooding has given me, No. 1, enormous respect for Administrator Criswell. She was right there after the flood along with her wonderful FEMA staff doing everything they could to help communities. But once the immediate event has come and gone and the repair and recovery has to start, it is going to take, oftentimes, a year or more for communities to repair bridges, for families to get an answer on whether they do or don't get a buyout, for farms to get what meager relief may be available. And what we have seen is that at that point, the centralization of decision-making authority and responsibility with various FEMA offices located around the country and the FEMA office in charge of Vermont that has to make these decisions about yes or no on moving forward on a bridge or a buyout--things that are really crucially important to Vermonters, to our local governments, to our homeowners--is in Puerto Rico. And what I have seen is that the energy and the effort and the resources and the talent is at the local level. So if you are on the selectboard in Lyndonville, you have got the responsibility to your voters to get that bridge fixed. You actually know who the best contractors are. You know how to get it done. But the way it works right now, those decisions about moving forward on a recovery project are made in a distant location. I have talked to many of my colleagues about a similar aftermath of the original event: The immediate aid is provided, but then when you are talking about a contract, you are talking about implementation, the reality is we have to have, in my view, much more local control, much more local responsibility, and much more local capacity with the resources that are available through FEMA. It means the decisions will be made sooner, the work will be done in a more cost-effective and efficient way. I raise that because I am talking to colleagues who have had similar experiences, some in States that are Republican-led, some Democratic- led. It really doesn't matter. It is about trying to get that authority at the local level so that the local people--whether it is Mississippi or Vermont--have much more authority, responsibility, and capacity to carry out those very, very needed repairs. So that will be something I will be inviting my colleagues to work with me on. This last summer, I spent a good deal of time traveling to the flooded communities--and there are too many of them in Vermont--to see what has happened to our homes, our small businesses and farms, to roads and bridges that were washed out. And folks across Vermont--in places like Moretown and Plainfield and Barre and Barnet, St. Johnsbury, Peacham, Lyndonville, and Hardwick--are all reeling from what has happened. They are pulling together; they are coming back. Neighbors are helping neighbors, but it is not going to get done unless we provide the supplemental funding with the disaster relief fund that is essential to the well-being of Vermonters, as well as the well-being of folks who have suffered from these catastrophic weather events across the country. Vermont will hang in, but we do need help. And we are ready, as we always have been, to help others.

Mr. WELCH

Mr. WELCH. Mr. President, in late July, Vermonters and Americans mourned the passing of Bob Newhart, a talented and award-winning actor who changed the history of comedy forever. His celebrated television show, ``Newhart'' aired on CBS from 1982 to 1990 and gave the United States a window into dreamy, rural Vermont's picturesque Green Mountain view. As Dick Loudon, Mr. Newhart brought laughter and Vermont Values into the living rooms of millions of Americans. In ``Newhart,'' Dick and his wife escape New York City and buy the Stratford Inn, better known by the real-world residents of Middlebury, VT, as the Waybury Inn. The production crew saw the Waybury Inn while scouting locations and knew it was the perfect location. The inn still has props from the show on display, and the 214-year-old inn hosts travelers and diners to this day. Over the show's 184 episodes, Mr. Newhart and his cast centered their show around the fictional Stratford Inn, capturing the very real spirit and beauty of Vermont and the hard- working people that make it home. Television and the arts play the important role in our lives and culture, bringing together friends and families, bridging cultural divides, and helping heal during times of difficulty. Mr. Newhart's Grammy and Emmy award winning performances and countless television shows and movies exemplify the power of comedy--and the essential role the arts play in our social fabric. Mr. Newhart was an icon of comedy and Hollywood, but Vermonters will always remember his time as our favorite innkeeper.