Political Quotes

“I don't have objection to the article being included in the Record, but I would note that, once again, the Senator from Oregon is limited by the fact that he has not participated in the debate on this in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for the last 2 years, because what he stated in his first remarks was that there was no way to stop the pipeline initially and the Trump administration failed to do so. That was factually incorrect. We stopped the pipeline the day President Trump signed the bipartisan Cruz-Shaheen sanctions into law. That was December of 2019, and the pipeline was stopped for over a year. As I mentioned, on January 24 of 2020, 4 days after Joe Biden was sworn into office, Putin began-- returned to building the pipeline because Biden had already telegraphed his surrender to Russia. Now, what my friend from Oregon just said is--he repeated news coverage that the pipeline is now, today, complete. That is, in fact, correct, that because Biden surrendered on this point, Putin went all in and finished the pipeline. But this is where being part of the Foreign Relations Committee discussion matters, because even though the pipeline is now physically complete, it does not mean it is operative. After the pipeline is physically complete, there are months of certifications required and multiple authorities. The legislation that Congress passed as a bipartisan matter also imposes sanctions on any entity, any company that certifies the pipeline.…”