Political Quotes

“earlier today, this morning, the administration announced the intent to remove all American troops--not a large presence, but all Americans troops--from Syria. I want to be clear, as I have been all day about this, that I believe it is a catastrophic mistake that will have grave consequences for the United States, for our interests, and our allies in the months and years to come. I want to take a moment to come here and explain why. The rationale behind the decision we were given today by the administration is that there is no longer a need for U.S. presence in Syria because ISIS has been defeated. Just a week ago, the President's own envoy to the global coalition on ISIS said this, and I want to quote from the statement that he gave last week to the press. He said: [T]he end of ISIS will be a much more long-term initiative. Nobody is declaring a mission accomplished. We know that once the physical space is defeated we can't just pick up and leave. This was a quote from the President's own envoy to the global coalition on ISIS--not 6 months ago, 6 days ago. We don't have time here or I could take up all the time of the Senate to outline statement after statement from military and diplomatic officials in the administration basically echoing the same point. The point that we are making is this. ISIS still controls territory, particularly, in the Euphrates River valley of Syria.…”