Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Floor Speech

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Mrs. SHAHEEN. Madam President, I am pleased to join my colleagues and very much appreciate Senator Udall's leadership on the joint resolution we are speaking to today. This is the resolution that would end the President's unconstitutional emergency declaration, which is diverting money from critical military construction projects to fund a costly and ineffective border wall.

Congress has made it abundantly clear that we did not provide funding for the President's border wall and that we don't approve of raiding military resources to fund his campaign promise--which, by the way, the President vowed Mexico would pay for.

It is important to note that Congress works on a bipartisan basis to provide funding to secure the southern border. According to the Constitution, it is Congress and not the President who holds the power of the purse. Just 6 months ago, in a strong bipartisan vote, a majority of this body--59 Senators--successfully passed the resolution disapproving of the President's emergency declaration. Unfortunately, President Trump chose to veto that legislation, which is why we have brought it to the floor again for a vote.

It is imperative that this legislative body--this Senate--defend its authority as derived from the Constitution and protect funding that is vital to our troops and to our national security.

I think it is difficult to overstate the critical role military construction projects play in maintaining military readiness and supporting our national defense. Yet this administration is treating funding set aside for our national security like a slush fund.

Take military construction, for instance. At the Portsmouth Naval shipyard in New Hampshire and Maine--it is on the border between New Hampshire and Maine--any disruptions for funding in construction projects can result in costly delays to our military's carefully crafted plans to upgrade aging infrastructure. Delays in projects that support the shipyard's mission threaten to exacerbate the Navy's already high demand for submarine maintenance and the projected submarine shortfall in the coming years.

In addition, New Hampshire's National Guard readiness centers are in desperate need of modernization, and they can't afford further delays to readiness center improvements. All those projects are funded through the military construction program.

While New Hampshire's and Maine's shipyard and National Guard were spared from President Trump's latest money grab, the same can't be said for 127 other important military construction projects across this country.

The 552 middle school children at Fort Campbell in the majority leader's home State of Kentucky will have to wait for a new school as President Trump diverts construction funding to the border.

Critical projects in Virginia that would improve a cyber operations facility and replace hazardous materials in warehouses are another casualty of President Trump's political games.

The Child Development Center in Maryland, the missile field in Alaska, the weapon maintenance shop in Alabama--the list of projects that are affected by the President's unconstitutional mandate just goes on and on. It includes hundreds of millions of dollars for critical infrastructure to support the Defense Department's European Deterrence Initiative. What message does that send to our European allies on our efforts to deter Russian aggression?

The impact of the President's actions and Congress's own complacency is painfully real to the men and women who serve our Nation. These are the same men and women who are being deprived of the resources they need to complete their mission.

Perhaps not surprising, there are now reports indicating that the Trump administration is again planning to take military construction funds appropriated by Congress to build the border wall. According to the Washington Post, you can see this pretty clearly. The administration plans to pitch its appropriations request to Congress as replenishment money to the Department of Defense for the money they took this year to fund the border wall.

A Trump administration official said:

The plan is to sell it as replenishment money. . . . Then once they got it from Congress, they would take it again.

This isn't just a one-time deal. We are talking about the administration setting us up to do this again and again and again. This type of deception from the administration makes funding the government extremely difficult for Congress because we can't trust--we don't know if the President is negotiating in good faith.

The Members of the legislative branch are endowed by the Constitution with the power to fund the government. We must be sure that the resources we provide in spending legislation are being used as they were intended by the Congress. This constitutional duty is particularly salient when the President has shown such a flagrant disregard for congressional intent and the constitutional separation of powers. The authority of the Congress is very clear: The power of the purse is held by the legislative branch. Those powers were enumerated for the very reason that we are here today--to shield against an overreaching Executive.

This isn't about Democrat versus Republican; this is about whether Congress votes to uphold its powers and responsibilities--powers and responsibilities that are enshrined in the Constitution. We must take action now in defense of both our Constitution and our national security.

I would urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to protect our constitutional authority as Members of Congress, to defend our national security, and to support the resolution to terminate President Trump's emergency declaration.

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