Housing for the 21st Century Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I rise today to oppose the resolution that my Democrat friends brought here to the floor.

It is very short--only a few pages long--but the operative part of it is only 18 words. It is on page 3.

It says:

Congress hereby directs the President to remove the United States Armed Forces from hostilities within or against Iran.

Real simple--they are telling the President he must stop and remove our troops from the conflict that we are currently involved in.

It is important to remember what we are doing here and what the Democrats are trying to do here. I am going to talk in two different parts. One is of the War Powers Act and the Constitution. We have all sat through hundreds of hours of argument on this. So I am not going to spend a lot of time on it. The third part is how we got here, where we are, and where we are going, which is a little more interesting, I think.

In any event, as far as the War Powers Act, it was enacted in 1973 by Congress. It was designed to try to cut into the constitutional powers of the President under article II of the Constitution. Every single President--every one of them since then, Democrat and Republican--has refused to accept this as constitutional, the War Powers Act. They have always said that it infringes on the President's article II constitutional authorities to defend the American people and to complete the oath they have taken to defend the country.

So 45 of the last 47 Presidents, which is all we have had, have ordered kinetic acts--just like President Trump has done--without going to Congress. This isn't new. This has happened in 45 of the last 47 Presidencies. Article II of the Constitution clearly gives the President not only the right but, indeed, the duty, as does his oath, to protect the United States.

Having said all of this, the claim is that what the President did is illegal. Well, if that is what they really believe over here, then what are we doing here? All we are doing is yakking here. What they should do is go across the street to the Court and file suit, if it is illegal, to stop it. They sue him three times every day before breakfast. What difference does one more lawsuit make? That is what they should do. That is the remedy if they think it is illegal.

Now, more interesting are the three parts of this: How did we get here? Where are we in this moment? Where do we go from here?

Forty-seven years ago, this started. What you had was the Iranians take over our Embassy in Iran. They illegally held and kidnapped and restrained our diplomats there--a number of them--for 444 days. At that point in time, 47 years ago, there were two sides. On one side was us, the United States and Israel. On the other side was Iran and all the other actors in the region, the Arab countries that surrounded them. That was the difference from where things were then as to where they are today.

What has happened over the last 47 years is the Arab countries have gotten tired of this. They are sick and tired of this.

So where are we today? We are at the point today where you have only one bad apple left in the region, and that is Iran--and, of course, their proxies, the three agents--Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis, all of whom are actually just part of Iran.

When Iran is defeated--and they will be here--the three agents are gone too. Hezbollah has been badly decimated already. The other two-- Hamas has been almost decimated completely, and the Houthis are still around. But all three of those are going to be gone when, indeed, Iran is defeated, which it will be here before very long.

So over these 47 years, what Iran has done--while the Arab counties have moved away, while they have moved to wanting peace and security in the region--they have continued to murder thousands of Americans. They have killed thousands of Americans.

I grabbed the list and was going to bring it out here. It would take me about half an hour to read all of the sins that the Iranians have committed over these 47 years.

So we are left in a very, very different place today. The Arab countries want nothing to do with this, and we are going to deal with a different Middle East than what we have.

Today, I am more optimistic than I have ever been about the Middle East. I really believe that when we end this and the Iranian regime is brought down, we are going to have a Middle East that is going to be very peaceful, and it is going to be a different Middle East as we go forward.

The people will look back at this and say: When did that happen?

I think the turning point was the Abraham Accords, but in addition to that, it has happened in other respects also.

You say: Well, what evidence do you have of that?

You know, during the Hamas war between Israel and Hamas, the Iranians decided one day to launch 300 missiles against Israel, and they did that. None of those landed. None of those did any damage because of the overhead defense they have, but also, you had Israeli pilots, U.S. pilots, British pilots, and French pilots flying to protect Israel and take out these missiles.

That is not the big news. On that same night, the big news is that two Arab countries were also flying. Jordan and the Saudis were flying to protect Israel from the onslaught of missiles from Iran. That is clear evidence that the Middle East has changed. It is a different place today, and it is continuing to be a better place.

Since this most recent war broke out, the Arab countries have decided to side with us and side against Iran. They are all by themselves.

Iran is decimated. That is where we are at this moment. Their navy is at the bottom of the sea. Their air force is nonexistent. Yesterday, a Yak-130 took off in Iran. It lasted just moments in the air before it was taken out by one of our F-35s. They are done. They are through. Their missiles and their drone stockpiles are dwindling and dwindling badly. The strikes are becoming less and less that they are able to put out there. This is going to end, and it is going to end rapidly. This is not a forever war--indeed, not even close to it. This is going to end very quickly.

The Commander in Chief ordered this attack because of the increase in the manufacturing of long- and medium-range missiles and after trying to restart the nuclear program that was decimated in the 12-day war. All this time, they had us sitting at the table, dragging out and yakking away at negotiations that were going absolutely nowhere. For that reason, he did what he did, and that is, ordered our brave young men and women to do what they are doing today.

The message to the regime I would have today for them is, no one is coming to help. I said that before in the 12-year war; I was right. Today, the same is true. China is not coming. Russia is not coming. North Korea is not coming. Cuba is not coming. Venezuela is not coming.

They are not coming to help you, Iran. No one is coming.

But there is one entity left that is trying to help you, Iran regime, only one on this planet, and that is my friends over here. They have brought this--and you heard the language I said. They are trying to use the process of the U.S. Senate to stop our Commander in Chief from doing what he has set out to do.

No other entity on the planet is attempting to help you, Iran. Nobody. Nobody except one, and that one is right here. But we are going to end that now. It ends now. It ends here in a few moments when we have this vote.

To our brave men and women, I say: You are fighting to accomplish the task and the objectives that the President, our Commander in Chief, has given you. We are proud of you. We are about to help you.

Know this: We have your back. We are about to defeat here on this floor the last entity that is trying to stop you from doing the job that the President of the United States has given you. Bless you for what you are doing.

Bless the United States of America.

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