On the recordJuly 13, 2023
It is worth acknowledging the great bipartisan work on this issue with my colleague, Ms. Jacobs, and my colleague, Mr. McGovern, who have been speaking on these issues with clarity for some time. The opponents of the amendment made the principal argument that we have to do anything for Ukraine to win the war. Why not just send the nukes? If the standard is we will do anything for Ukraine to win, then send them tactical nuclear weapons. Of course, we are not going to do that, which means there has to be a line somewhere. I would hope that we could draw that line somewhere on the humane side of the cluster bomb question. These bombs are indiscriminate. For goodness' sake, we are still cleaning up cluster bombs in Laos because civilians are being killed. When my colleagues say, well, civilians won't be killed, tell that to the people in the places where cluster munitions have been deployed, and people are still being killed because that is, in fact, the case. It is also an argument that has been made that Ukrainians are only going to use this in their own country. How depraved to use these bombs in your own country? That is not a reason to vote against the amendment. It is the reason to vote for it.
