National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017
Floor Speech
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Mr. SULLIVAN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Iowa who has distinguished military service and just retired. We are honored that she is leading this colloquy today.
I am honored to be here with some of my colleagues. Our freshman class sees this as a critical issue, and many of us have been on the floor all week to stress the importance of what Senator Ernst just spoke about--funding our troops and stopping this filibuster that denies our troops funding.
Although we have been out here all week, I am not sure I have seen any of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle coming to the floor to try to explain to the American people why they have filibustered funding for our troops not once, not twice, not three times but four times in the last year. Hopefully, they will not do it again today for the fifth time.
It has been a good week for the Senate. We passed the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act, which was bipartisan. Senator Whitehouse, Senator Portman, and Senator Ayotte led that. We passed the FAA authorization, led by Senator Thune and Senator Nelson, which will protect the American people in the aviation space.
But we have more important work today on defense issues and on national security issues, and much of it is dealing with supporting our troops. This is not a partisan issue. They need the support.
This past week, the President and Secretary of Defense have made many more commitments with regard to our troops, with 8,400 troops in Afghanistan, 560 additional troops in Iraq, 1,000 additional troops in Poland and a battalion headquarters, and two carrier battle groups in the South China Sea. They are protecting us, they are supporting us, and we should be doing the same. It is that simple.
Along with my colleagues, I find it amazing, remarkable, and, to be quite honest, I find it sad that the minority leader is encouraging a filibuster of the Defense appropriations bill again for the fifth time in a year.
I think my colleagues on the other side of the aisle should reject this approach. They are going to have the opportunity in the next hour to come down here and actually vote to fund our troops, and I guarantee that regardless of what State they are from, regardless of what political party they represent, the American people in every State of the United States support funding our troops and dropping this ridiculous filibuster against the men and women in uniform who are out there right now protecting us.
I call on all of my colleagues to do the right thing by our troops and by the American people and to vote today to fund our troops.
All of my colleagues have been very focused on this, but no more so than my colleagues from Iowa, North Carolina, and Montana. All of us have significant military populations and experience.
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Mr. SULLIVAN. Madam President, I have a motion to instruct at the desk and ask for its consideration.
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Mr. SULLIVAN. Madam President, I rise to support my motion to instruct in relation to the NDAA of 2017. In the past few weeks the President and the Secretary of Defense have made additional military commitments across the globe for our men and women in uniform, and we have read about these. These include 560 troops to Iraq to help reinforce the fight against ISIS, a decision to keep 8,400 members of the military in Afghanistan fighting against terrorism, 1,000 troops in Poland and a headquarters to beef up NATO's eastern flank, as well as two carrier strike groups in the South China Sea to protect freedom of the seas.
I believe many of us are supportive of these commitments. However, in order to support these pledges, we need to make sure we fully authorize these commitments so our brave men and women in uniform have everything they need to fight and win these battles.
When our service men and women train here and deploy abroad, they need to know that the Congress of the United States and the Senate of the United States stand with them. Supporting this motion to instruct lets them know we have their back, as we should.
I yield to my colleague from Rhode Island, Senator Reed.
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Mr. SULLIVAN. Madam President, as you can see, there is bipartisan support for this measure. I ask that all my colleagues support it now.
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