Executive Calendar
Floor Speech
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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I want to thank my colleague from Virginia for his advocacy on this critical measure, and I support him on it and also for his advocacy on the FIRE Act. It is very similar to the measure on which I am going to ask for unanimous consent. He has done wonderful and dedicated work on both measures.
1247; that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; that the bill be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate.
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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I truly regret the objection by my colleague. I regret even more the reasons for his objection, characterizing the threat of Russia interference as hysteria.
Well, I suggest that my friend from Kentucky spend a little bit of time--it will not take a lot--with members of the intelligence community, any member of the intelligence community, all the members of the intelligence community, who agree unanimously that the threat of Russian interference is real. In fact, it is ongoing.
That is the warning we have received from the CIA, the Director of National Intelligence, and, most pointedly, from the Director of the FBI. They have warned us, in no uncertain terms, that the Russians are interfering now, spreading disinformation, creating false accounts and sites and that they are planning to do it even more intensely. It is not only the Russians but other nations.
That was the warning of Robert Mueller when he said that the Russians' interference in our last election was sweeping and systematic and that they were doing it again and we need to pay attention to it.
That is exactly what my colleagues and I have been doing for the past few days, raising for floor consideration various election securities bills. We have done it not only in the last few days but for months-- the PAVE Act, the Honest Ads Act, the SHIELD Act, but my colleague from Kentucky says it is hysteria.
Well, it is a well-founded fear based on fact. As one of our former colleagues, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, once said: People are entitled to their own opinions; they are not entitled to their own facts. The facts here are indisputable, set forth in numbing detail by the Mueller report but also by the intelligence community, independently, in the hearings that have been conducted by various of our committees, in open and public, in Armed Services and Judiciary, and also behind closed doors. Some of them the intelligence community--which produced a report, most recently by the Senate Intelligence Committee, a bipartisan report, showing how the Russians scan every single State to penetrate them, seeking to disrupt them, and that is an absolutely chilling fact-based, evidence-founded prospect that we need to counter, and that is the reason my colleagues and I have come to the floor for these measures. A number of them I have been proud to cosponsor and helped to lead.
The one that brings me here now is the Duty to Report Act, S. 1247, and it very simply says there is a duty to report. If there is an illegal offer of assistance, if anyone knows of an illegal acceptance of assistance from a foreign leader or foreign national or foreign government, there is a duty to tell the FBI or some other law enforcement official.
The plain fact is our elections are under attack, and 2016 was only a dress rehearsal.
Just this week, talk about hysteria, Facebook banned dozens of fake Russian and Iranian accounts attempting to spread misinformation and disinformation to Americans--the purpose: to disrupt the 2020 election.
It isn't necessarily an ad for one candidate or another. It may be an ad that seeks to suppress the vote. The point is, that attack will continue, and opposition to it is based on hysteria about the potential political implications.
What saddens and angers me is that our Commander in Chief--not just some of our colleagues--refuses to believe that our elections were attacked and will be again. He is actively working to undermine our democracy.
The President's attempts to invite a foreign leader, the Ukrainian President, to interfere in our democratic elections was a betrayal of his oath of office and an abuse of power. It is an impeachable offense. But it will occur again by others, as well as him, if we do not pass measures like the Duty to Report Act.
It started with a whistleblower complaint, but now we have call notes between the President and Ukraine President Zelensky, the corroborating statements of multiple witnesses in the government, and President Trump's own statements--his own words--on live television, admitting that he did this. The transcript of his call chillingly shows how he literally pressured and extorted the Ukrainian President, using the threat of a cut or elimination of military aid vital to Ukrainian lives and Ukrainian defense against an ongoing Russian attack, not to mention the visit to the White House, also used as leverage with these 10 powerful words: ``I would like you to do us a favor though.'' The favor was digging dirt on a political opponent through a full investigation to favor himself over that opponent.
The invitation to interfere in our elections goes to the core of our democratic institutions. It is literally condoning and, in fact, inviting and encouraging an attack on our democratic institution, and the President has said, when he was asked, that if he were offered foreign assistance, he would take it. His son, during the last campaign, was offered Russian assistance, and his response was: ``I love it.''
That is not the appropriate response for the offer of an illegal act of assistance. It should be to go to the FBI or another law enforcement agency.
Every Republican should be asked to answer the question--in fact, forced to answer this question: Is it acceptable to solicit or accept the assistance of a foreign power to win an election?
We cannot allow this kind of practice to become the new normal. It is already illegal to accept or solicit such an assistance from a foreign government or leader, and what we want to do is make it illegal to fail to report it.
Finally, as for my colleagues' objection that it would inhibit somehow an active and honest campaign, someone who has reason to know that there is an illegal offer of assistance and someone who knows that that assistance is being solicited by his or her campaign or a member of their family, certainly, should feel a duty to report as a matter of simple patriotism and moral obligation, not to mention legal responsibility.
With the 2020 Presidential election looming, we must stop this kind of foreign interference. We must take active and effective measures against it. We must ensure that the American people--not Russia or China or Iran, and they are all gunning for our democratic institution--decide who the leaders of this country will be and what direction our democracy will take.
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