ISIS

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, during the past month, two American journalists were murdered by a fanatical Islamic terrorist group, the Islamic State, known as ISIL. The murder of these two journalists is part of a campaign of horrific brutality that has included crucifixions, rape, the slaughter of civilians, and prosecution of religious minorities, including Christians and Yazidis.

Currently ISIL holds large sections of land in both Iraq and Syria, and the group has made clear that its ambitions extend even further. Meanwhile, Iran continues its efforts to enrich uranium, Ukraine is struggling to prevent further Russian incursions, and the Islamic militants in Libya recently seized the U.S. Embassy compound after Americans were forced to evacuate the war-torn country.

Here at home we are facing a crisis on our southern border thanks to the President's policies which have encouraged thousands of unaccompanied children to undertake the dangerous journey to the United States.

On the economic front, millions of middle-class families are being squeezed by the Obama economy and Obamacare. Job growth last month was a disappointing 142,000 jobs, the worst report this year, and far from the numbers we need to get the economy going again. Unemployment remains high, and the unemployment rate would be even higher if millions of Americans hadn't gotten so discouraged by the lack of job prospects that they gave up looking for work altogether.

Meanwhile, ObamaCare has not only failed to fix the problems in our health care system, it has made them worse. American families are facing higher health care premiums and fewer health care choices. In short, our country is facing serious challenges both at home and abroad.

What are Democrats doing about all these challenges? Well, this week they are taking up legislation that limits Americans' First Amendment rights. That is right; instead of taking up any of the 40 House-passed jobs bills, addressing our border crisis, or focusing on the international challenges we are facing, Democrats have decided to spend the first part of a brief 2-week session rewriting the First Amendment. It is no wonder a George Washington University Battleground poll found that 70 percent of Americans think the country is on the wrong track.

Our First Amendment right to freedom of speech is one of our most fundamental rights. It is the right that helps protect all of our other rights by keeping government accountable and ensuring that all Americans, not just those whose party is in power, get to make their voices heard.

The Democrats' proposed constitutional amendment would severely curtail this freedom by giving Congress and State governments the authority to regulate political speech. That means Congress will get to decide how much of a voice Americans are allowed in the political process. And that is bad news for Americans of every political affiliation. Under the Democrats' legislation, the party in power could effectively silence the voices of those who disagree with them.

Democrats are unhappy about recent decisions by the Supreme Court that rolled back some of the restrictions on free speech and increased individuals' voices in the political process. So their solution is a constitutional amendment to shut down the voices of those who disagree with them. Apparently they don't realize that is not the way the American system works.

In America, if you don't like what your opponents are saying, you have the freedom to persuade your opponents to adopt your position or you persuade the American people to vote against them. You don't try to revoke their right to speak. That is what they do in totalitarian societies. It is not what we do here in America.

In the United States your political power is supposed to exist in proportion to the strength of your ideas, not in proportion to your ability to silence your critics. Fortunately for Americans of every political persuasion, the Democrats' amendment is unlikely to go anywhere in Congress--as Democrats well know.

So why are they taking up this legislation this week when there are so many problems, foreign and domestic, that need to be addressed? The answer is simple. Democrats are worried about reelection, and they think this legislation somehow will help them get reelected. They have passed this amendment to appeal to members in the far-left base who want restrictions on political speech or at least on political speech with which they disagree. Democrats are betting that seeing this amendment defeated in Congress will encourage members of their political base to come to the polls in November. That, of course, has been Democrats' legislative strategy all year.

The New York Times reported back in March that Democrats plan to spend the spring and summer on messaging votes, "timed''--and I quote, "to coincide with campaign-style trips by President Obama.''

"Democrats concede,'' the Times reported, "that making new laws is not really the point. Rather, they are trying to force Republicans to vote against them.''

Let me repeat that. Despite the economic challenges facing American families and steadily growing international unrest, the Democrats have spent the past several months pursuing a legislative strategy in which "making new laws is really not the point.''

We have seen that time and time again here over the past several months on the floor of the Senate where we come here on a daily basis casting political show votes, knowing they are not going anywhere, designed to appeal to a political constituency that they hope will come out and support them during the November elections. Instead of pursuing political consensus--the only way to actually accomplish anything in a divided Congress--Senate Democrats have brought up bill after bill to pander to their political base. It is disappointing that the Democrats have put their electoral prospects over Americans' freedom of speech this week. And it is disappointing that Democrats have spent this entire year on political show votes instead of substantial legislation to address the many challenges that are facing American families. The President has been no help. Instead of urging Democrats in Congress to work with Republicans on Senate legislation to deal with our country's most serious problems, he has been focused on campaigning. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that campaigning has been the President's main concern for the majority of his Presidency, whether it is involved in delaying Obama regulations to protect Democrats in the 2012 elections or his decision last week to defer his executive action on immigration until after the election in what White House officials essentially admitted was an attempt to protect Democrats in November.

There is a place for campaigning--we all know that. We all do it--but it is not in the halls of Congress or in the Oval Office. We were elected to govern, and that means we should be spending our time on legislation to meet our Nation's challenges. We should be taking up legislation to support job creation. We should be fighting to give middle-class families a break from ObamaCare's high premiums and reduced choices. We should be taking up measures to advance energy independence in this country and make energy more affordable for working families. We should be focused on what we need to do to address the crises abroad and America's security here at home.

Republicans are working to create jobs; Democrats are trying to save their own. It is not too late for Democrats to join Republicans to come up with bipartisan solutions to the challenges facing our country. The House of Representatives passed somewhere on the order of 350 bills, all of which are collecting dust here in the Senate, 40 of which specifically deal with the issues of the economy and job creation which every poll says is the American people's No. 1 priority. Yet here we are again in a shortened work period where we have a couple of weeks to actually do some things that would bend the curve in the direction of lowering the unemployment rate, growing the economy, creating more jobs. We have a whole series of bills that have been passed by the other Chamber, the House of Representatives, that have been sent here which specifically deal with the issue of jobs and the economy that are sitting at the desk collecting dust because the majority leader has chosen instead to try to bring to the floor a whole bunch of things he thinks are additive in terms of getting the vote out for Democrats in November elections but frankly do absolutely nothing to address the serious concerns and challenges that are facing middle-class families all across this country. The people's representatives can do better. The people's representatives should do better. Whenever Democrats here decide they are ready to stop campaigning and start governing, Republicans are ready to go to work.

Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source