David Perdue: “reserving the right to object, what we have here is another distraction from what we in this body need to be focused on…”

“reserving the right to object, what we have here is another distraction from what we in this body need to be focused on today; that is, funding the Federal Government and confirming this President's nominees. Right now, we have just 23 working days, as a result of the way the Senate operates, between now and the end of the fiscal year--just 23 days. Meanwhile, we have 329 nominees. These are Presidential nominees waiting for this body to confirm them. We need to stay on track. This resolution is no more than political theater. This resolution was previously objected to by Senator Cornyn just last week. It will continue to be objected to again because it is unnecessary. The Senate, the House of Representatives, and our intelligence community have all thoroughly investigated this matter. In fact, the Senate Intelligence Committee has held 16 open hearings, dating back to January of 2017. They all found that Russia did, in fact, attempt to interfere in the U.S. election. We all take that very seriously. However, let's be crystal clear. They also found there is no evidence this interference impacted the outcome of the Presidential election in 2016 at all. This President and this body have consistently been tough on Russia. I have personally cosponsored strong sanctions on Russia and introduced legislation condemning Russian military aggression around the world.…”