Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, before I start my remarks on the dangers of nuclear war, I want to take a moment to congratulate the Watertown High School field hockey program in Massachusetts.

Up until this past week, the Watertown Raiders had not lost a single field hockey game since November 12, 2008. For nearly 9 years, the Raiders have been truly perfect. Their 184-game winning streak was our Nation's longest in high school field hockey history. Their leader, Head Coach Eileen Donahue, is one of the most historic figures in Massachusetts high school athletics.

To all the former and current players, coaches, parents and supporters, I offer my congratulations on this incredible accomplishment.

Go, Watertown Raiders. Congratulations on a historic streak of victories.

Nuclear Weapons

Mr. President, now on the issue of nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons give the President of the United States an unprecedented and awesome power. Nuclear weapons are the most destructive force in human history.
Yet, under existing laws, the President of the United States possesses unilateral authority to launch them. If the President wants to, he has the power to initiate an offensive nuclear war, even if there is no attack on the United States or its allies. This is simply unconstitutional, undemocratic, and simply unbelievable.

Such unconstrained power flies in the face of our Constitution, which gives Congress the sole and exclusive power to declare war. While it is vital for the President to have clear authority to respond to nuclear attacks on the United States, our forces, or our allies, no U.S. President should have the power to launch a nuclear first strike without congressional approval.

Such a strike would be immoral. It would be disproportionate, and it would expose the United States to the threat of devastating nuclear retaliation, which could endanger the survival of the American people and human civilization. If we lead potential enemies to believe that we may go nuclear in response to a conventional attack, then we create the very pressure that encourages them to build nuclear arsenals and keep them on high alert. This increases the risk of inadvertent nuclear war, a prospect that is just plain unacceptable.

We have the world's most powerful conventional arsenal--the strongest Air Force, the largest Navy, and the most capable Army and Marine Corps. And we have the most powerful nuclear arsenal to deter nuclear attacks. We don't need to threaten to be the first to attack with nuclear weapons to deter others from launching attacks on us or our allies.

Nuclear weapons are meant for deterrence and not for warfighting. As President Reagan said: ``A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.''

That is why I introduced legislation earlier this year and submitted an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act, which we are now considering, to put an appropriate check on the American President's unilateral authority to launch a nuclear first strike.

Let me be clear. I am not proposing we restrict the President's authority under the Constitution to launch a nuclear attack against anyone who is carrying out a nuclear attack on the United States, our territories, or our allies. Under article II of the Constitution, the United States President has authority to repel sudden attacks as soon as our military and intelligence agencies inform him that such an enemy strike is imminent. What I have proposed does not change that.

But what I am proposing is that we take a commonsense step to check nuclear first use by prohibiting any American President from launching a nuclear first strike, except when explicitly authorized to do so by a congressional declaration of war.

Unfortunately, the need to submit this into law is more important now than it has ever been, and that is because today we have a President who is engaged in escalatory, reckless, and downright scary rhetoric with North Korea, a nation with nuclear weapons. President Trump has threatened ``fire and fury'' and has declared our military ``locked and loaded'' and ready to attack North Korea. On what seems like a daily basis, President Trump uses the kind of inflammatory rhetoric backed by his unchecked authority to launch nuclear weapons, which highlights the very situation I described earlier.

The United States threatens military action that could include nuclear weapons, North Korea responds with increasingly provocative behavior, and the world faces an ever-increasing risk of miscalculation that can lead to nuclear war.

I have been talking about no first use and the need to provide an appropriate check on any American President for a long time, but President Trump and his Twitter account have made it painfully clear why the need for a no-first-use policy exists.

No human being should have the sole authority to initiate an unprovoked nuclear war, not any American President, including Donald Trump. As long as that power exists, it must be put in check.

We need to have this debate in the United States of America. We don't need an accidental nuclear war. We don't need nuclear weapons to be used by the United States when we have not been attacked by nuclear weapons. And if any President would want to use that power, then he should come to Congress and ask us to vote on the use of nuclear weapons in the event we have never been attacked by them. That is the least I think the Congress should do.

We have abdicated our responsibility to declare war under the Constitution for far too long. It actually began with the Korean war. Now we face the prospect of a second Korean war. If nuclear weapons are going to be used and we have not been attacked, it should be this body that votes to give the President the ability to use those weapons.

I yield the floor.

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