Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Mr. MURPHY. Madam President, in my lifetime, no American President has ever had a more disastrous overseas trip than the one that was just concluded by President Trump--5 days of disaster after disaster, insult after insult, capitulation after capitulation. Today, Donald Trump has America weaker in the world than at any time in recent memory.

Let's start with what just happened today that has the whole world reeling. To the shock and horror of the American public, President Trump stood on stage with Vladimir Putin and told the world that he believes Putin when Putin insists that Russia did not try to interfere in the American elections in Trump's favor in 2016.

Despite what President Trump wants us to believe these days, there are still some truths left in the world. Not everything is political spin. Not everything in the world today is up for debate. Russia did attack our elections in 2016. They plan on attacking our elections in 2018. In 2016, they did so with the explicit purpose of trying to elect Donald Trump. All 100 Senators agree on this. Every U.S. intelligence agency agrees on this. Every U.S. law enforcement agency in the country agrees on this. Everyone working for Donald Trump in his national security cabinet agrees on this.

Now, we actually have the specific names of the specific Russian individuals who carried out these attacks. They have been indicted by Donald Trump's Department of Justice. There is simply no question, no debate over whether the Russian Government engaged in a massive, willful, illegal campaign to push the 2016 election to Donald Trump. It is a fact.

President Trump, no doubt, doesn't like this fact. First, because there is an investigation that is pending right now over the outstanding question of whether he knew it was happening and whether he and his campaign team coordinated with the Russians to make that happen. There is increasing evidence that this might be the case, but we will have to wait for the Mueller report to know.

Second, without the Russians' help, it is possible that Donald Trump might not be President. We don't know this, but the slim margins where the President prevailed in certain States leave room to surmise that without Russia's help, Donald Trump might not have been elected President.

Regardless of whether Trump coordinated with the Russians and regardless of whether their support tipped the balance, it frankly doesn't explain what just happened in Helsinki. When asked if Trump agrees with his staff, every Member of the Senate, and every law enforcement and intelligence agency in his government or Russia, he chose Russia.

Let me say that again. When asked whether the President of the United States believed his own government or Russia, our President said he believed Russia. He took sides against American national security interests, and we are left with a question of why. We raise that question because, frankly, the expectations for this summit, this meeting between the American President and the Russian leader, were very low. All President Trump had to do at that press conference today was to offer some mild pushback--an acknowledgment of Russia's interference in the election--and to stand up and, in mild terms, offer America's support for the sovereignty of Ukraine. He didn't do any of that. So we are left with this question of why.

Now I don't know what Mueller knows. I don't know what Vladimir Putin knows. But Americans should be freaked out today that there is some explanation that we don't know for why our President is so friendly to Russian national security interests and so hostile to our own.

Of course, today, my colleagues, was just the icing on the cake. We already have forgotten what happened on the first 4 days of this trip. Shortly before the meeting with Putin, Trump announced to the world that after several days of meetings and consultations with our European partners, he could definitively say that Europe was an enemy of the United States. He called the European Union a foe. That conclusion was bracketed by his comments upon his arrival in Europe, when he announced that his meeting with Putin was going to be a whole lot easier than his meetings were going to be with Europe.

Let's be clear. First, Europe is our most important friend and ally, and it has been that way for a very long time, and nothing has changed. In the last 70 years, when we have needed help in the world, the first place we turn to is Europe. It shares our democratic values. They are our most important trading partner. The post-World War II order that has ushered in an order of relative global stability never before seen in the world is reliant on the continued alliance of the United States and Europe.

We have always had our grievances. We may want them to spend a little bit more money on defense. They may want us to shoulder a little bit more of the burden with respect to the world's refugee crisis and not leave it all up to them. But the alliance is just as important as it ever has been, and Europe is just as important a partner as it ever has been.

Here is the other thing to make clear. Donald Trump's intent is to smash the European Union and to break the United States and Europe apart from each other. His advisers and Cabinet members may go on TV or show up to hearings on Capitol Hill, and they may say all the right things about the strength of the transatlantic alliance and America's rock-solid commitment to NATO. I have heard them say it. I saw John Bolton say it on TV this weekend. I watched Secretary Pompeo come to the Foreign Relations Committee and testify to such before Congress.

But the people who work for President Trump don't set U.S. policy. The President does, and the President has made it clear over and over that NATO is temporarily functionally irrelevant.

That sounds like a radical thing to say, but let's just admit that it is true for the time being. Trump has made it crystal clear that if Russia ever perpetuated a Ukraine-style attack on a NATO country, one that was in plain sight for everybody to see but that was officially denied by the Kremlin--does that sound familiar? That is what happened in Ukraine--a clear Russian invasion but officially denied by the Kremlin. Does this sound familiar? The 2016 attacks on American elections are there for everyone to see, and they are denied by the Kremlin. Trump has made it clear that if Russia ever perpetuated an attack like that against a NATO country, Trump would believe Russia and not his own eyes, not his own government. He has telegraphed to Russia that if you simply deny the invasion or the attack, we will believe you, not our own government, not our own intelligence and security agencies. That is what he told us.

That is what would likely happen if Europe was attacked. The Europeans know this. Why we are so much weaker today is because that message to the Europeans comes with a price. If the Europeans don't feel that we are going to get their back, having watched the President mock and insult them over the course of the last 4 days, it is now in doubt as to whether they would come to our defense if we asked, as we did after the attacks on September 11.

None of our European partners will say that. They are going to try to save face. They are going to try to be the bigger party to this contest and say that the strength of the alliance is as strong as it ever has been. But it is not, and there are consequences--potentially serious ones for the United States.

For as bad a shape as the President left NATO, the EU is in no better condition today. It is in tatters in large part because of a President who continues to cheerlead those who want to break apart the EU. There are people who understand the genius of the European Union who are working hard to keep it together, and I am going to cheerlead them, but President Trump spent his time in Britain telling anybody who would listen, including the press, that unless Britain carried out a clean break from the EU, there would be consequences from the United States. That is madness. Our policy should be the opposite--that if Britain and the EU want to reconcile, America will be there to assist.

Let's bring it back to Vladimir Putin again because his top priority--his No. 1 goal--is the dissolution of the European Union, which is his main political and economic rival on the Eurasian continent. The breakup of NATO is right up there as well. His chief ally in the deconstruction of the EU and NATO today is the President of the United States.

America is so much weaker today than we were just 5 days ago, and that is saying a lot. Our Nation and the world has never seen a more cataclysmic foreign trip than the one that we just witnessed.

This country can survive a lot. We are resilient. But President Trump is making this country a laughing stock. We used to be a pillar of strength, an example to be looked up to. Now we are the butt of jokes. We are seen as weak--a total pushover. All you need to do if you are a despot or an autocrat or an enemy of America is to get in the room with the U.S. President, and he will give you everything you want, with no price to pay.

That is America in the world today, and I couldn't be sadder about it.

I yield back.

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