mr. kennedy: thank you, madam president. madam president, a lot of history has unfolded in this room. the united states senate has been home to some of the most formative debates in our nation's tenure. these are fierce arguments among passionate, intelligent people. it's not all that different from the debates today. the senate has always welcomed these sometimes tense disagreements by respecting the rules and the traditions of the institution. it's how a senator like me, who

is a member of the minority party, can stand here and speak freely about the issues that matter to the american people and to the people of louisiana. now, my democratic colleagues in the senate today may be about to make some new history in this room. apparently they think it's a brave new world, and they want to set a dangerous new precedent. for the very first time senate democrats are seeking to table, maybe even dismiss an impeachment of a sitting cabinet official without even holding a trial. they are summoning spirits they won't be able to control. please, my colleagues, don't do it. i fear, though, that senate

democrats are going to try to take the articles of impeachment that our colleagues in the united states house of representatives thoughtfully crafted and passed with a majority vote and toss them into the trash without hearing from either side. they don't want to let the house impeachment managers make their case. they don't want to let secretary mayorkas make his case. they just want to ignore the house's evidence summarily, sweep it under the rug, and move on, and that is wrong. the senate has never in its history tabled an impeachment. never. in the more than 200 years that this body has existed, the house of representatives has impeached an official 21 times and we have

never once tabled the impeachment. not once. now senator schumer may also try to dismiss these charges instead of tabling them. but that's never been done before either. if the senate dismisses these charges without a trial, it will be the first time in the senate's long history that it has dismissed impeachment charges against an official it has jurisdiction over without that official first resigning, and that's a fact. i want you to consider this. the united states house of representatives has voted to impeach an official 21 times. only 21 times in our long history. the united states senate has only dismissed three of those cases. three out of 21. now why did they dismiss them? in two of those cases the

impeached official chose to resign instead of facing a trial. as a result, the senate dismissed the charges. in this case secretary mayorkas has not resigned. in one of those dismissed cases the impeached official was a united states senator. and the senate concluded that the constitution did not give it jurisdiction to remove a u.s. senator through the impeachment process. here everyone agrees that the constitution gives congress the power to impeach and remove a sitting cabinet secretary. now, madam president, listen to me carefully on this. the united states senate has the right and the responsibility to hold this trial. yet, senate democrats want to ignore our chamber's history and forfeit our constitutional

authority by tabling or dismissing these charges without even considering the evidence. without even considering the evidence. americans need to hear what i'm about to say, even if my democratic colleagues won't listen. let me say it again. a majority of the duly elected members of the united states house of representatives who represent all of the communities across america spent months investigating the allegations against secretary mayorkas. they spent months drafting the articles of impeachment. and a majority of the house then voted yes to bring two very serious charges. the senate democrats are now treating those charges, those

articles of impeachment, like spam that landed in their in box. americans, however, are not nearly so sanguine about the border crisis that has brought death, drugs, violence, chaos, criminals, and mayhem into their neighborhoods. the biden administration's border crisis is as unprecedented as the majority leader's move to bury the evidence of who could be to blame here. i for one want to hear the house's evidence, and so do the american people. the majority leader's move is unprecedented. it's un-democratic. and i am confident that my democratic colleagues, if they do this, please don't, but if they do it will regret this new

precedent when they find themselves in the minority. just as they regretted breaking the senate precedent for confirming judicial nominees. you see, republicans do not like to break precedent when we're in the majority. we respect the traditions of this chamber because we respect the voters who sent all 100 of us here. if my democratic colleagues set a new precedent that tramples the rights of the minority party and silences the voices of the americans who elected them, if they do that, senate democrats will have to own that decision and bear its consequences. now, madam president, i've listened to the loon wing of the democratic party spend the better part of the past decade

making passionate speeches about how important it is to protect democracy, to uphold the rule of law. and they're right. president biden even ran his campaign on the idea of restoring our norms as he called them and defending democracy. apparently, though, the rules of the loon wing were of the for this and not for me variety. whenever protecting democracy and upholding the rule of law becomes politically challenging, the loon wing has been happy to ignore the rule of law and the will of the people. isn't that special. their political expedience is in full view today. but it's not the first time that their cynicism has reared its

ugly democratic head. i'm sure, madam president, you will remember -- i'll give you just two examples -- the loon wing spent several years promoting a conspiracy that the trump campaign was an arm of the kremlin, despite no objective evidence to tie president trump to russia. democrats and several members of the national security community rushed to dismiss any information found on mr. hunter biden's latop as, quote, russian misinformation, despite not having any objective evidence we now know to make that claim. and those are just two of many examples that i could give. p secretary mayorkas's impeachment may be the best example of this hypocrisy to

date. the same senate democrats who have shouted for years about defending democracy and upholding the rule of law seem ready to disregard serious impeachment charges without so much as a second glance. these senators, if they do that, won't just be silencing the house of representatives, madam president. they'll be silencing the american people. the american people who want their borders security back. you can pick any poll, any one you want, and you'll find president biden's approval rate on the issue of immigration and border security it on a journey to the center of the earth. a recent associated press poll, for example, found that more than two-thirds of americans, 69% of americans, disapprove of how the biden administration is

handling border security. i can't imagine that these same americans will approve of democrats' refusal to even hear the evidence that americans see play out in their communities every day. this poll is only surprising if you peaked in high school. under president biden and secretary mayorkas, the southern border has become an open, bleeding wound. it's become a cesspool of misery, drug trafficking, human trafficking, sexual abuse of women, sexual abuse of children, drowning, dehydration, widespread illnesses, death, all have become commonplace. in total, border patrol has

encountered illegal immigrants at the southern border more than nine million times since president biden took office. that's four nebraskas. the biden administration failed to disapprove. the backlog of immigrant cases has doubled under the biden administration's watch. these foreign nationals overwhelmed american cities. instead of investing in american citizens, scities throughout th country are raising taxes, they're cutting programs to fund prepaid debit cards for migrants. american children have to stay home from school because democratic officials turned their classrooms into housing units. democratic leaders in new york city, chicago, denver, houston, los angeles have begged the

biden administration to do something to curb the flow of unveted people into their cities. of course, it's not just people flowing illegally over that border, madam president. cartels that flooded the united states with poisonous fentanyl over that border too. customs and border protection seized nearly 53 pounds of fentanyl from 2021 to 2023. not 53,000 grams. 53,000 pounds. that's enough to kill the entire population of our planet. this poise -- this poison did kill more than 70,000 americans in 2022. it's now the leading cause of death among americans 18 to 40. the biden administration's border policies bring americans

nothing but suffering. if you hate america, however, the biden border strategy has been a blessing. cartel smuggling operations saw revenues increase from $500 million in 2012 to $12 billion, that's b as in billon, in 2022. the policies that president biden and secretary mayorkas have implemented are directly responsible for this disaster at our southern border. at every turn, the biden administration has ignored the laws of this land and this congress and the will of the american people to facilitate their own broken border security policies. now, the house has detailed several examples in their articles of impeachment. and we ought to hair their -- we

ought to hear their evidence. to start, the law requires all foreign nationals not clearly admissible must be, quote, retained for a removal proceeding. instead, secretary mayorkas established a catch and release. catch, release, repeat. a catch-and-release scheme that incentivized illegal aliens to flood our country. the law also requires that law enforcement take an illegal immigrant who commits a crime or has ties to terrorism, or both, into federal custody. that's the law. yet secretary mayorkas told his department not to follow that law regarding the, quote, mandatory arrest and detention, closed quote, of criminal aliens. our law also says law enforcement must detain illegal immigrants. instead, secretary m. has --

secretary mayorkas has paroled them wholesale into our country, where they catch can bus or plane into any unsuspecting community they stared. not only that -- they desired. not only that, secretary mayorkas gave them the money to do it. secretary mayorkas killed the remain in mexico program, squashed contracts to build a border wall, ended the safe third country agreement that allowed america to work with other countries to find protection for migrants in need. by tabling or dismissing the kralths of impeachment -- the articles of impeachment without so much as a trial, my senate democratic colleagues will be endorsing the biden administration's lawless approach to the southern border. they will be setting a precedent that the next administration can ignore the laws of congress and the will of the american people

too. impeachment matters, madam president. it's an important check we have on the executive branch. and we have an obligation to take it seriously. we have an obligation to give any charges brought the full trial they deserve. i'm going to have a resolution, if i'm allowed to present it, madam president, that will give the procedures we need to conduct this trial fairly and efficiently. and i will be bringing that at the appropriate time. it will be efficient, it will be fair, it will be honest, it won't uproot the long-standing precedent we have given to articles of impeachment in the past. if the majority leader and my democratic colleagues table or dismiss these charges and destroy senate precedent, precedent that we've established to conduct full and fair

impeachment trials, they will regret it. they will regret it. senate democrats, if they do that, will show the world that their proclamations about rule of law and protecting democracy are just tools of their own political experience and arrogance. senate democrats will let the american people know that they endorse the lawlessness and the misery the biden administration's broken border has brought to this country. i don't think america's future should be beholden to the politics of the moment, and that's why i want the senate to do its job and hear this evidence. madam president, i yield the floor.

mr. scott: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. scott: madam president, i want to make one thing clear to my democrat colleagues, your attempt to brush secretary mayorkas's impeachment trial under the rug is disgusting and unacceptable. it is truly unprecedented to violate senate rules and is possibly unconstitutional. the house of representatives adopted two articles of impeachment against secretary mayorkas. let me quote for you -- throughout his at the presenture as secretary of homeland -- tenure as secretary of homeland security, he violated laws enacted by congress regarding immigration and border security. in large part because of his unlawful conduct, millions of aliens have illegally entered the united states on an annual basis with many unlawfully remaining in the united states.

alejandro mayorkas knowingly mayse made false statements and unlawfully -- principally too obfuscate the rules smarlt of his systemic refusal to comply with the law. now, it is the constitutional duty of the u.s. senate to conduct an impeachment trial to determine if secretary mayorkas should be removed from office based on those articles of impeachment. i want to stress again, never in the history of the u.s. senate has such a procedural move been attempted to completely avoid an impeachment trial. senate democrats' efforts to avoid fulfilling their constitutional duty to conduct this trial are just the latest attack by the left against our democratic process and institution. senate democrats want to eliminate the filibuster. they want to radically change the u.s. supreme court. now they want to trash the impeachment process. this is a disturbing series of

direct attacks on our democratic institutions. my colleagues and i have called on senate leadership to conduct a thorough trial. i've also personally called on vice president kamala harris, urging her to fulfill her constitutional duty to serve as presiding officer of secretary mayorkas's trial. her appointment as president biden's, quote, border czar, only makes her role in the mayorkas impeachment trial more critical. president biden and his administration created a crisis at our southern border. secretary mayorkas, a completely puppet for this lawless administration, has the audacity to come falsely testify before senate and house committees that the border is secure. not just once, but multiple times. mayorkas has lied under oath in committee that our border is secure. he's lying to the american public. he's not taking the action needed to defend the homeland by securing the border or upholding

the law. that's his job, and he simply is not doing it. our nation is reeling from the consequences of mayorkas' failures. our nation is more dangerous because secretary mayorkas and his failures. he's allowing criminals, drugs, terrorists, others into our communities. these are real consequences and each victim has a name. real americans. here to live their dream are being killed. american families are being torn apart by vicious crimes and deadly drugs because we have a wide-open border. when biden administration and mayorkas refuse to enforce federal law to secure the border, and innocent americans like laken riley pay the ultimate price for his failure. ten million people have illegally crosses, and sex million let into our country.

there have been sexual assaults, murders committed by imlegal ill -- illegal aliens. even in florida, with, a young man has killed, the man charged is an illegal alien. i don't get it. i do not understand why my democratic colleagues don't care. they don't care about 60,000 people -- 170,000 -- 270,000 people -- 70,000 people dying the fentanyls. innocent democrats do not care. they're using every power to ignore this eyes is while innocents meants -- innocent americans die, and keep congress from holding mayorkas accountable. the proof is not just in this disgraceful effort to dismiss. let's remember what democrats voted again. democrats voted against a bill to stop illegal aliens from getting on a commercial flight with no verifiable i.d. think about that. you have to have an idaho, they don't -- you have to have an

i.d., they don't. democrats voted against supporting police. the people here taking care of united states. democrats voted against the laken riley act, which simply requires, it's a simple act, requires ice to take illegal aliens who commit crimes into custody before tragedies strike. does biden hope millions of immigrants will vote for him? they've voted to allow the census to keep counting illegal aliens. it's because they want sanctuary cities and states to have more electoral votes and representation in congress. not from americans, but from illegal aliens. that's the future democrats want. biden has dismantled, he's intentionally dismantled every ounce of border security trump put in place, and completely undermined our immigration system. and mayorkas has done absolutely

nothing to stop it. mayorkas has clearly been derelict in his duties. he's neglected to protect the homeland, his job. he's allowed criminals to come into our country, each and all of our communities, drugs to flow into our country. when i talk to floridians, they're terrified, concerned about their family safety because of who and what is coming across the southern border into our communities. mayorkas might simply be a puppet for the administration, but he is fully responsible for his negligence and failure to do his job. mayorkas needs to either resign or have the full and thorough trial we are constitutionally obligated to conduct. as the american people through their representatives voted for. we must have an administration and dhs secretary willing to secure the border, not ignore failure that is killing our

citizens. madam president, i yield the floor. mr. lee: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from utah. mr. lee: madam president, invasion is taking place on american soil. over eight million people have crossed our border illegally since mayorkas became secretary, and the numbers keep rising. they're not going away. this unprecedented, lawless influx includes gang members, it includes drug traffickers, and dangerous individuals from every country in the world, including many thousands of military-age males from china. what could go wrong? in december alone, the department of homeland security reported 302,000 encounters. in one month. this is the highest month ever on record. to be clear, secretary mayorkas has the tools to stop the invasion today. he could do it right now if he

wanted it. it's almost turnkey, abracadabra. if he decided, we could have a secure border, and we would. not only does he have the tools, but he has an obligation and a responsibility, an affirmative duty under the law, under the laws of the united states, laws that he agreed he would faithfully enforce. let me say that again, to be very clear. just by enforcing the laws currently on the books, he could bring our state of utter lawlessness on the border to a state of order. mayorkas could bring a complete stop to the crisis. he doesn't need legislatesive -- legislative action from congress. this isn't a policy disagreement. no, it's a blatant defiance of the laws that have been on the books for years. if you're so confident that the charges against secretary mayorkas are baseless, then why

not hold a trial? why try to just sweep this under the rug? you realize, don't you, that when you do that, all that does is just make you look more conscious of what's going on, of what's being done that's so very, very wrong, especially where, as here, it's such a departure from nearly two and a half centuries of this institution operating faithfully as a court of impeachment. nearly two and a half centuries in which, you know, we've had 21 articles of impeachment that were destined for the senate. at least 20 of those arrived. in 18 of those total of 21 cases during the senate's existence, 18 of those 21 culminated in a trial, resulting in a verdict of guilty or not guilty. those other three involved cases that were rendered moot, in

between the time that the house of representatives had adopted the articles of impeachment and the time they were prersented over here. either because of a death or a new vacancy in the office that had been occupied by the impeached official. so this isn't just an ordinary act of sweeping it under the rug. it is an act of sweeping it under the rug under circumstances where sweeping under the rug isn't an option of. it never has been. we haven't done it. this isn't just some invisible casper the friendly ghost coming in to get rid of it. they're actively doing it and they're doing it under the full view of the american people. the american people should be really upset about this because article i of the constitution gives the house of representatives the power to impeach and the senate the power to try all impeachments. remember, the senate has only three states of being, exactly three states of being -- legislative calendar, where we do a lot of of our work, where

we consider laws; executive calendar, where we do things like confirm presidential nominees and consider treaties for ratification; and the third state of being for the senate is as a court of impeachment. we're always in one of those three states of being. and yet we have never operated in that third state of being, unless the case has been rendered moot, where the senate doesn't hold a trial, as it's required to do under the constitution, culminating in a verdict of guilty or not guilty. now, if you trust that secretary mayorkas didn't authorize millions of individuals to enter illegally into our country for swift and precursory release, then let's hold a trial. if you're certain that secretary

mayorkas hasn't increased the pull factors incentivizing parents across the glow ebb to send -- globe to send 430,000 unaccompanied children illegal little into the united states, in many cases to have them end up in the hands of traffickers, drug traffickers, sex trafficksers and otherwise, then let's hold a trial. if you're confident that secretary mayorkas hasn't created at least 13 illegal immigration parole programs designed to increase the flow of people in that country by the hundreds of thousands, then let's hold a trial. if you're so sure that secretary mayorkas, under secretary mayorkas' leadership customs and border protection hasn't dramatically decreased its vetting process for allowing chinese immigrants to cross our border, including military-aged chinese males, then let's hold a trial. if you believe that we haven't seen a dramatic increase in the

known terrorist encounters at our border, then let's hold a trial. if you're confident that secretary mayorkas hasn't allowed enough fentanyl to flow across the southern border to kill every man, woman, and child in this country, then let's hold a freaking trial. madam president, these are not victimless crimes. the tragic case of laken rile reilly you a life cut short by an illegal alien. secretary mayorkas allowed to enter our country illegal lay, unchecked, unveted is, is an abdication of his duty. laken isn't alone. her case represents hundreds of thousands of families across the nation -- across this nation whose lives have been upended by

the invasion that our leaders allowed to happen. think about that for a minute. they allowed it to happen, not by negligence, oversight, carelessness, inattentiveness. no, no, no. they encouraged it to happen. should secretary mayorkas be found guilty, these are crimes of the highest order. this is the sort of thing that doesn't happen very often in this country, the sort of thing that i hope we'll never have to experience again. the sort of thing that could otherwise result in a toby keith song, may he rest in peace. the american people understand something is terribly wrong and we expect us to act, madam president. in all briefs impeachments sent to the senate, we held a trial.

saved those rare circumstances where the case was rendered moot by death or vacancy of the office, not facts present here. we held a trial and that trial cull minute in a -- culminated in a verdict of guilty or not guilty. but, majority leader chuck schumer now seems to want a take the radical step, the unprecedented step is the lawless step, the counter-anti- -- the anti-constitutional step of trying to table these articles of impeachment without even letting us examine the evidence. this begs the question -- what would he do, what would he do if he were confident, if the

majority leader were confident that secretary mayorkas had acted lawfully, honorably in this office? what would he do if he were confident that the american people weren't turning on his party because of this act of lawlessness, this interminable obsession of object surdties by the logic of their own border nonenforcement strategy. this is exactly what it looks like, madam president, when someone is aware that there is a problem and wants to sweep the problem under the rug. there is no rug here. you can't hide this. there's no rug big enough to accommodate that and shame on us if we play into that strategy. so, look, to colleagues on my side of the aisle and on the other, i implore you -- i know many of us are institutionists,

whether where you a republican or democrat, no matter how far toward the left wing or the right wing or somewhere in between you are, i appeal to your sense that we have an obligation to take seriously our oaths to the constitution, that we have an obligation that must be honored to look out for the institutional interests of the senate and the role that this plays in the sacred order created by the united states constitution. when the articles of impeachment arrive, they have a job to do. to ignore the evidence before us is to betray the trust of those who sent us here. there's no doubt at this point that the invasion at the southern border has inflicted indescribable, incalculable, intolerable pain and suffering on far too many americans.

we're obligated to figure out who's responsible and hold them accountable, beginning with secretary mayorkas. i urge each of my colleagues to oppose this shameless effort to sidestep our constitutional duty and by so doing subvert the constitutional order. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor.