Emergency Supplemental

Floor Speech

EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL -- (Senate - April 12, 2007)

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Mr. SESSIONS. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. THUNE. I am happy to yield to the Senator from Alabama.

Mr. SESSIONS. About the conference process, when an emergency supplemental is passed, even though it had language in it that I know the Senator opposes, and so do I, it would normally have to go to a conference committee of Members of the House of Representatives and Members of the Senate. Sometimes it takes a good while, does it not, historically, for differences in the House and Senate bills to be worked out? It sometimes takes a good while; would the Senator agree?

Mr. THUNE. That is correct. The Senator is absolutely right. He well knows, anytime the House and Senate act on separate pieces of legislation, it has to go to a conference committee. Differences have to be worked out before the conference report can come back to the House and Senate and be passed and ultimately sent to the President.

Mr. SESSIONS. Those conference committee appointments are decided by the leaders of the Senate for the Senate conferees and the leaders of the House, the Speaker of the House, Ms. Pelosi, would appoint those conferees. If it were something they wanted to have done badly, that was high on her agenda, would not they have appointed conferees before we recessed almost 2 weeks ago so the conferees could have begun work during this interim period, staffs could have been working on these issues and been ready to move rapidly when the House comes back in session? If they had wanted to, couldn't they have done that?

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I serve with my colleague from Alabama on the Armed Services Committee. This is an issue he cares deeply about, making sure our men and women are well cared for and that they are in a position to do the work we ask them to do. It would make sense--I think it is fair to say--that the House, knowing they were going to take a 2-week recess, to appoint the conferees so the important work of the conference committee could get underway, so we wouldn't have to wait another several weeks to get this legislation through the conference committee, ultimately sent to the President, where it is certain to be vetoed, so that it has to come back here and start all over again. It seems that would be a fair expectation of our colleagues in the other body when it comes to appointing conferees for this important legislation.

Having served three terms in the House of Representatives, I had the privilege during those terms to represent my class as a Member of the House leadership. On a weekly basis, I had the opportunity, under both Speakers Gingrich and Hastert, to be a part of the process. I know how many pressures and how much responsibility comes with the job of Speaker of the House. Our Senate leaders on both sides have a caucus of about 50 people, thereabouts, that they have to deal with. The Speaker of the House has a responsibility for making sure that 435 Members of the House of Representatives are moving forward with a legislative agenda. There is a lot of responsibility, a lot of pressure. I have experienced and seen firsthand much of that.

What I don't understand, however, is where in the job description of the Speaker of the House comes this notion that somehow the Speaker of the House ought to be going out and meeting with Syrian leaders, countries and leadership that are aiding and abetting the people we are fighting against, our enemies in Iraq, and trying to conduct foreign policy, representing the interests of one of our allies, the Nation of Israel, and not only misrepresenting their views but, frankly, exercising authority that clearly they didn't give her to exercise. I am at a loss to explain why we would be here waiting to conference an important supplemental appropriations bill that will fund the troops while the leadership of the other body is traveling the world, conducting meetings that clearly ought to be in the purview of our representation at the State Department and the White House and diplomatic corps.

If the Senator from Alabama would like to make some comments on this particular subject, I am happy to yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, what time remains on this side?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 14 1/2 minutes.

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair.

I thank my colleague from South Dakota. I believe his National Guard per capita is one of the largest National Guards in the country. I know mine is, both on a per-capita and aggregate basis. We have soldiers in Iraq right now from our home States. I talked to the mother of a soldier who was recently killed, and this is a painful subject for us all. At this very moment throughout Baghdad, Al Anbar Province, American soldiers are walking those streets, working closely with Iraqi soldiers, Iraqi police officers, in an effort to create stability so that political agreements can be reached that could lead to a stable and successful Iraq. This is an extremely, deeply important matter. Now we are in a situation in which our leader in the Senate, Democratic leader, Senator Reid, has said they intend to fund our troops. They intend to provide the money the President needs to conduct this war, but at the same time they want to tell the generals how to conduct it. They want to say that on a given date we have to move troops in this direction or that direction, and we will begin to bring troops home 4 months from today, regardless of the conditions in Iraq, regardless of what the military experts say, without any real thought, if you want to know the truth.

I have been to Iraq four times and will be soon going my fifth. Very few
people in the Senate have been there so often. I submit we don't know sufficiently how to direct the deployment of our troops. I don't know. Who knows the best? General Petraeus? This is his third full tour over there. He has studied insurgencies and written a Department of Defense manual on how to defeat an insurgency.

Who is the best qualified to make these decisions? This is not a little matter. We voted, over three-fourths of this Senate, to authorize military force in Iraq. Our soldiers are doing what we asked them to do--not what they want to do, what their duty is.

A father of a military Army officer told me right out here a few weeks ago--his son was about to go to Iraq--he said: Senator, they are watching you like a hawk. Our soldiers over there are watching what we in Congress do. They wonder what is going on.

They are putting their necks on the line for the policies we asked them to do, and they hear this kind of talk, they hear of this delay. We can't get even the emergency supplemental passed. It is very discouraging to me. I don't believe this is an action worthy of a responsible Senate. We know this Senate has the power, this Congress has the power to shut off funding for the war in Iraq and bring our troops home immediately.

But if we are not going to do that--and the Democratic leader said we are not going to do that, we are going to give them the money they need under this supplemental--if we are not going to bring them home, and we are going to give them the money, for Heaven's sakes, let's don't micromanage what they do, and let's don't demand commitments from the Commander in Chief he cannot agree to.

He cannot agree to 100 Senators telling him when and how to deploy the troops. What would General Petraeus think? What would his responsibility be to his general whom he asked to serve, who is serving, whom he told would be given responsibility to be successful in Iraq and bring stability there, with his whole effort focused on that?

I wish to share with my colleagues a deep concern that we not get into some sort of game of chicken with the President and the Congress. I must say, I am glad the Democratic leaders apparently said last night, after earlier saying no, now they will meet with the President at his request to discuss their differences.

But it is not just a political game of chicken between the Congress and the President; we have soldiers in the field whose lives are at risk this very moment. They need better support than that. Our allies need to know we are not going to be acting in a way this Senate resolution suggests. The enemy needs to know we are not going to be acting in that fashion, in my view.

We have a tough challenge over there, there is no doubt about it. General Petraeus committed, at my request, that if he thought what we were doing would not be successful, he would not hesitate to tell the Congress and the American people exactly that. I believe he will. Right now, he believes he can be successful. If we allow him to do so, I believe he will be.

Mr. President, I see others on the floor. I conclude by saying I believe we ought not to be in this posture of brinksmanship over this issue. I believe it is irresponsible. I believe it places those soldiers we have sent at greater risk for their lives, and their mission is placed in a situation where it would be more difficult to accomplish. That is something we should not do. I hope cooler heads will prevail.

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask the Senator from Alabama if he will yield for a question.

Mr. SESSIONS. I am pleased to yield.

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I say to the Senator, I agree with everything he said. The thing I guess that has troubled me about this process since the inception of the debate we have had in the Senate, that has been swirling around in Washington for some time, has to do with the way this supplemental bill was constructed and the proscriptive language that was put in it relative to tying the hands of our Commander in Chief, tying the hands of our generals, essentially substituting the judgment of politics in Washington for the judgment of our generals in the field.

I am extremely troubled by that language, as is the President, which is why he has indicated he is going to veto this bill when it comes before him. They knew that. They knew that when it was passed. They knew when it went down there, it was going to be an issue which the President, absolutely, in his constitutional role as Commander in Chief, could not allow--that type of language and that type of restriction--to be imposed on his ability to prosecute and win wars.

But I guess my question to the Senator from Alabama has to do with: If the Senate or the House wanted to stop what is happening in Iraq, wanted to withdraw, get our troops home immediately--in spite of the fact that under this new strategy we now have more troops there, we have different rules of engagement, we have more buy-in from the Iraqis; the Iraqis are coming more into the fight; we have an opportunity, in my view, at least, hopefully, to have success there--what is the step the Congress, if they wanted to basically end our involvement there, could do? Is it not to cut off funding? Would that not be?

If the Senate and the House were serious about this, why is it they are going about all these shenanigans, trying to provoke this confrontation with the President over this particular language that ties his hands relative to time lines, when in fact the real constitutional role the Congress has is funding? Is funding not the way, if the Senate and the House wanted to be heard on this, they would go about doing that?

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I could not agree with the Senator more. Having been in the Department of Justice a number of years as U.S. attorney and having had a few occasions to deal with this specific issue, money not appropriated by Congress cannot be spent by the Government. In fact, there is an Antideficiency Act that makes it a criminal offense for a governmental official to spend money that Congress has not appropriated.

So that is our responsibility: to fund or not fund. The Democratic leader said they are going to fund. It is not our responsibility to micromanage the war, however. So I would say we absolutely as a Congress--if we reach that decision--can shut off funding, and tomorrow the troops would have to be brought home, or shortly thereafter.

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I would say to the Senator from Alabama because I think it is an important point to make--I have heard the debate here a lot, and, again, as it continues in this city and across the country, that there has to be a political or diplomatic solution that somehow we have to reach; the sides have to come together, which I do not disagree with. However, I would also argue, in order for that to happen, you have to have security. You cannot have a functioning democracy or government absent security; in the last several hours, a couple of lawmakers in Iraq were killed in the Green Zone.

How is a government to function, how is a political process to work, if there is not adequate security, which is the point I believe many of us have made all along. I say to my colleague from Alabama, there has to be not only a political solution, but there has to be security established. That is what this new strategy is designed to accomplish, to allow that process to work. We ought to allow this strategy an opportunity to work, rather than pass bills out of here that tie the hands of the President, tie the hands of our generals, substitute the judgment of politicians in Washington for the judgment of our generals in the field. Furthermore, we need to get funding to our troops.

So I think the Senator from Alabama has put it very eloquently, and I join him in urging the rest of our colleagues in the Senate--and, obviously, hopefully, very soon in the House--to get this process wrapped up, to get a bill to the President that he will ultimately veto, send it back here, start over again, and let's at least get the funding to our troops so we can get this situation in Iraq secure so this political process can function and work and, hopefully, create a stable democracy.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I say to Senator Thune, I agree, and will recall for our colleagues that--I believe it was postelection--General Schoomaker, the Chief of Staff of the Army, pleaded with us not to allow what happened last year to happen this year. He was referring to delaying passing the supplemental because it causes all kinds of problems.

A few weeks ago, he testified again, and he was passionate about this. It is his soldiers, predominantly, Army soldiers in Iraq. He pleaded with us not to delay this supplemental. He said you have to take money from all kinds of accounts, and time and effort the leadership in the Department of Defense needs to be spending helping the soldiers being successful has to be redirected to bringing money together in ways that are not easy to fund the effort. He described it as trying to walk through a marsh waste deep in water--those were his words--in the muck.

We are creating a political muck that makes it very difficult and adds additional burdens to our Defense Department when they have so many important things to do. We should not do that.

I thank the Senator for his eloquent remarks and his leadership on the Armed Services Committee and for his commitment to our soldiers and commitment to the United States of America and the good foreign policy we have had, we seek to accomplish.

Our foreign policy is a foreign policy designed to improve the Middle East. It is designed to improve the lives of the people in Iraq. It is not an imperialistic attempt to gain wealth or power at their expense. We want them to be successful. In the end, it will be successful for us. It will make us more safe. It will make the world more safe and can begin the end of some of the radicalism we are seeing.

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