Lindsey Graham

What is the question? I will take a voice vote, absolutely. The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Washington.

This amendment will get your attention. About 500,000 or 600,000 Federal employees will be furloughed because of sequestration. They are going to miss 1 day a week of pay. We can't dock our own pay constitutionally, but I am asking through…

Yes. We need to vote on this. The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from South Carolina.

I can assure you, I would not have done that if I had known this year in the President's budget they would be suspending the MOX program for a study.

I will not entertain for 1 minute a disposition plan other than MOX.

We have an agreement with the Russians and now is not the time to break that agreement.

I do believe that if you are going to give a man or woman the power to send someone in battle and to literally go and die, that we should trust their judgment when it comes to disciplining that unit.

I believe a new day is here, and all I ask is that when we find this new way forward, that we still preserve the ability of the system to judge every individual case based on the individual facts.

Let us find out what we need to resource that is not being resourced and make this a priority because I will end with this thought.

The enemies of this Nation have never faced a finer military force than exists today, and we have problems.

But having said that, please do not mistake the push-back for an understanding that sexual assault in the military needs to be addressed and we need to improve upon the current system because what we have today is not working.

I think there are women out there that feel because of the particular facts and circumstances of their military service, their ability to get a piece of justice is limited.

If women in the military--and men are victims too. But if you really believe that there is no place for you to go and you are being abused, that has to be the worst possible feeling in the world.

I think that the hearing today shows the need for Congress to be involved.

The reason I bring that up is I want to make sure that people understand one case has to be put in terms of the whole system.

There is no city, there is no State, there is no county that is going to take it more serious than the men and women before you.

This concern that this is a buddy-buddy system, I just want the public to understand that the convening authority, particularly for general courts-martial that would involve a case of rape or some serious sexual assault, is a distance away…

I want people to understand the convening authority cannot increase the sentence.

It makes no sense that a young American should put on the uniform and then sacrifice their constitutional rights.

Do all of you believe if you had had somebody in your corner, someone assigned to kind of help you through the system, an advocate, that that would have helped?

When 47 or 49 percent--I cannot remember the number--feel intimidated to come forward because they think they may face reprisal, something is obviously wrong.

Is it the Navy's position that the convening authority should not have this power and it should be placed into someone else's hands?

Rape is not sexual harassment.

I could not welcome that more. It worked with the Detainee Treatment Act, it worked with the Military Commissions Act. I think it is the right way to go. Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I think that concludes our discussion. I would agree…

There are. MR. DURBIN. I might add that in my conversations with the President he welcomes this. He has invited us to come up with a legal architecture to make certain it is consistent with existing precedent and military law and other…