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Floor Speech

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Mr. HAWLEY. Mr. President.

What we are being asked to do--the Senate is being asked to do today, however, is to fast-track nominees for leadership positions in the Department of Defense to carry out a foreign policy that is manifestly failing. This administration is careening from one crisis to another, endangering the security of the American people, endangering the security of the world.

When the Senator mentioned just a moment ago the situation in Ukraine, you don't have to look any further than there to see the crisis--the latest crisis that the Biden administration has led this Nation into.

To begin with, the administration failed to deter Vladimir Putin and his Russian invasion before it happened. They failed to actually check Putin when it would have really mattered.

How did they do this? Well, for starters, when President Biden came to office, he opened up Russia's pipelines, and then he shut down America's pipelines. He handed our energy independence that the Senator was just mentioning--he handed our energy independence away. He gave it away. And who stepped in to fill the void? The Russians.

What is Russia? It is not so much a country as it is a gas station, and Putin is pumping and pumping and pumping. What is financing his war in Ukraine? It is not least our energy policies that are giving away our energy independence, giving away our energy dominance, and green- lighting his energy production. That is what Joe Biden did when he first came to office--green-lighting his production, shutting down our production.

But what else? President Biden had the opportunity to provide lethal military aid to Ukraine last spring when the Ukrainians first requested it. He said no. In fact, I believe he said no repeatedly for much of the year last year. That turns out to have been a very poor decision.

Now, today, deterrence having failed, the Russians engaged in an illegal invasion of a sovereign nation, threatening the stability of Europe, the security of Europe, and, of course, endangering our own national security, what is the President doing? What is President Biden doing? Is he turning back on American energy production? Is he sanctioning the Russian energy sector? No.

Just today, finally, he was dragged kicking and screaming to finally agree that this country will no longer import Russia's blood oil. Remember, he had us importing over 670,000 barrels of Russian oil every single day. Today, he announced finally, belatedly, we won't do that anymore. But what is he doing instead? He is going to every petty dictator on the face of the map and begging them to make up the difference. We learned that the President's team has been in touch with Maduro's regime--the murderous Maduro regime--in Venezuela and is preparing to offer them a special package that will ease the restrictions, ease the sanctions, ease the punishment on that outlaw regime and get them to make up the difference in oil production from Russia.

We learned that the President is potentially planning a trip to Saudi Arabia to ask the Saudis to increase their oil production to make up the difference from the Russians. I wonder if the topic of Jamal Khashoggi will come up in those meetings. I certainly hope it will.

President Biden once said that he would make Saudi Arabia ``pay the price, and make them in fact the pariah that they are.'' I guess that is no longer the policy of the U.S. Government because here is what we are reduced to under this administration: We are reduced to begging our enemies--our enemies, the dictators of the world--we are reduced to begging them to bail out a foreign policy that is failing, not least because this administration will not allow American workers to turn on American energy.

Apparently he doesn't, so this can't be about climate change. He is fine with more oil production but not in this country, not by American workers. Heaven forbid American workers be put back to work. Heaven forbid American workers actually earn more. Heaven forbid the American people be able to pay less at the pump, as Joe Biden's prices drive gas prices through the roof. No, this is the policy of weakness, fecklessness that this President has given us.

Let's not forget where it began. It began with Afghanistan. And that is the reason I am here on the floor today in particular.

It has been months now--months--since the fall of Afghanistan. This administration has lost two nations in the space of barely 6 months. The Afghanistan debacle is the worst foreign policy debacle in this country's history since Vietnam--although stay tuned, the way this administration is going--and what has this Congress done about it? Who has been held accountable for it?

I have come to this floor over and over and over to ask for accountability. Has someone been fired? No. Has someone been relieved of duty? No.

I was here just a few weeks ago after the Washington Post reported on a 2,000-page investigation done by Central Command into the fall of Afghanistan. Since that time, my team and I have been through all 2,000-plus pages.

I would just like to point out that we learned about this investigative report not from a hearing conducted by this body but from an investigative report by a newspaper. I am glad somebody has some interest in what happened in Afghanistan. Sadly, it seems not to be this Chamber.

Here are some of the things that we learned in this 2,000-page investigative report about Afghanistan:

We learned from GEN Scott Miller, who was the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan in early 2021, that he was extremely worried from May 2 onward as he saw key districts fall. In fact, General Miller testified to us that he warned Secretary Austin and General Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, as early as March or April that the Afghan security forces might collapse rapidly once we withdrew forces.

Now this report documents it and says, indeed, there is evidence that he was very worried, that he was warning that the collapse of Afghanistan would come quickly, he was warning that it would be imminent. But what did the Biden administration do? Did they order the evacuation of our civilians? Did they plan for the possible fall of the Afghan Government? No. The report goes on to detail that the National Security Council and the State Department showed a total lack of urgency right up until the final hours before the fall of Kabul.

We learned that RDML Peter Vasely, who took over for General Miller last spring and commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan during the final stages of the withdrawal, provided assessments weeks before the fall of Kabul that the trajectory of Afghanistan was in a downward spiral--this is a quote from the report--and was likely not recoverable.

The report goes on to say this: Rear Admiral Vasely ``was trying to get the Ambassador to see the security threat for what it really was.'' There were as many as 10 districts falling every day, getting closer and closer to Kabul. ``The embassy needed to position for withdrawal, but the Ambassador didn't get it.''

These are just a few of the details in this 2,000-page report showing that our military commanders warned over and over and over that Kabul was on the verge of collapse, that the security dangers were mounting, that civilians needed to be evacuated, and that we needed to change course, and this administration did nothing. What happened as a result? Thirteen servicemembers are dead, including one from my own State.

I will never forget talking to his family, his father, less than 48 hours after this young man, LCpl Jared Schmitz, lost his life, along with 12 others who bravely served this country, giving the uttermost of their devotion. But it didn't have to be that way.

Here is my point: This body should be hearing from these commanders, from these men and women who have testified in this report, who have given evidence about what happened in Afghanistan. We should be hearing from them in public, under oath--no more private briefings; no more closed-session briefings. We should hear from Secretary Austin. We should hear from General Milley. We should hear from the commanders-- General Miller--under oath. They should come and testify about this report.

We should do our job, and until we do, I will not consent to allow the Senate to bypass regular order and fast-track the nominations of yet more leadership positions to continue carrying on a failed policy. I will not do it.

There is a crisis in Ukraine. There is a crisis in Afghanistan. Crises multiply across the world at the hands of this administration, and still, this Congress refuses to reverse course and refuses to provide the most basic oversight that it is charged with providing.

I don't think it is too much to ask, in the face of this, in the face of these disasters, that we have the curiosity to at least have an open hearing, to at least ask who should be accountable and what should be done.

So I want to say again, I appreciate Senator Reed's earnestness on this issue. I appreciate the fact that he doesn't control the floor.

My final point, I would note, as I look toward the clock here, last week, if my memory serves, of the 4 days we were in session, we took a total of four votes in the U.S. Senate last week. If these nominees were as important as they say they are, we could have voted last week. We could have voted earlier today.

Now, Senator Reed doesn't control the floor, but I might just note to the majority leader that maybe instead of taking a vacation tomorrow, which I gather is the plan, that maybe the Senate ought to be here and working, and maybe we ought to be here and voting, because until there is some accountability for what happened in Afghanistan, for what is happening with this administration's foreign policy, I am going to ask the Senate to observe regular order and do its job and to vote.

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