Ted Cruz: “Reserving the right to object, I will respond briefly to the Senator from New Jersey. The talking point from the Biden…”

“Reserving the right to object, I will respond briefly to the Senator from New Jersey. The talking point from the Biden administration as to why they have given this gift to Vladimir Putin is they say the pipeline is almost completed; that it is over 90 percent complete. The problem with that argument is it is demonstrably false because it was equally true in December of 2019. In December of 2019, the pipeline was over 90 percent complete. And, indeed, at that time, there was a massive Russian disinformation campaign throughout Europe, where the Russian Government was putting out: These sanctions will never pass, and if they pass, they will never work. Why? Because the pipeline is over 90 percent complete. Well, a pipeline that is 90 percent complete is a pipeline that is zero percent complete. Until it is 100 percent complete, it transmits zero natural gas. The pipeline doesn't work until you finish it, and that Russian disinformation we discovered the day the sanction legislation was signed was exactly that, was utterly false, nonsense. Why? Because the day it was signed they stopped construction, and they stopped it for a year. And Putin only began construction after Joe Biden was elected, after he was sworn into office, and after his team indicated weakness, that they wouldn't enforce the sanctions against Russia. So their talking point that it was 90 percent complete, that was true a year ago. And we knew we could stop it then. We can stop it now.…”