Transcript: Democratic Members of the Senate Hold a News Conference on Troop Rotations

July 11, 2007 -- WEBB: As everyone in the room knows, we just had our vote on the amendment that I had proposed with respect to dwell time. I regret that we did not reach the 60-vote margin that would have caused this amendment to prevail. It was offered in the spirit of bipartisanship. It was offered with the intention to protect the wellbeing of our troops.

We had two days to debate it. There were a lot of representations on the other side that were not particularly true and, unfortunately, this ended up breaking down, for political reasons, into, for the most part, a resistance by the Republicans on an issue that we just shouldn't have had political implications.

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At the same time, we got a strong majority of the United States Senate to agree that this issue is vital to the wellbeing of the people who are being sent into harm's way and we're going to continue to focus on this issue and others in the future.

I have a number of my colleagues who have joined me today. I would like to make time so that they can speak. Senator Durbin was going to be here. I'm not sure he's here. Senator Biden is here and Senator Hagel, who was our lead cosponsor on the Republican side. And I'm not quite sure how protocol works, but I'm going to turn this over right now to Senator Murray.

MURRAY: On behalf of 56 members of the United States Senate, I want to thank Senator Webb for his tremendous leadership on an issue that is impacting thousands of families across our country.

Every one of us who goes home and watches our men and women go off to war has watched them over the last 4.5 years grow more exhausted and more tired and, importantly, their families, the stress and strain on their children, on their parents, on them as they just try to do what this country's asked them to do and serve our country.

The amendment that Senator Webb put before the Senate today said that we, as representatives here in the United States Senate, are going to make sure that our troops are cared for. 24/7 they are fighting overseas. When they come home, they ought to be given 24/7 by all of us. They haven't done that yet.

This administration has put a tremendous tax on our servicemen and women on top of asking them to go overseas and that is taking them away from their families and their training and the support they need here at home.

This is an incredibly important issue. All of us who supported this amendment are going to keep working, because certainly we owe the men and women who serve us a lot more than lip service. We owe them not standing behind procedural moves and motions in the United States Senate and we owe them a country that backs them and we are going to keep fighting.

We do have a number of members of the Senate here. Joining me in the leadership is Senator Durbin. I want to turn it over to him and then to other members of our caucus who would like to speak.

Following Senator Durbin, we will have Senator -- OK.

Chuck, why don't you speak and then Senator Durbin.

HAGEL: I'm part of the endangered species here. Well, nice to be with you. Thank you.

I've always had a high regard for Barbara Mikulski. Thank you for allowing me an opportunity to say something about this amendment. I, too, add my thanks to Jim Webb for his leadership.

I don't know of an issue more important to a free society that we pay more attention to than the preciousness of our people. When we ask our men and women to serve this country and particularly those who wear the uniform of this nation to carry all the burden, make all the sacrifices, and then we do not respond in a responsible way to their needs, that's wrong.

And I was part of the debate on this, listened carefully to all the points of view, and I was struck by the fact that somehow the Congress does not have a role to play on matters of war and peace. Constitutionally, of course, that's incorrect.

But I don't know of a higher priority or responsibility that the Congress has than the welfare of those we represent and it is not a mutually exclusive responsibility. We all have a responsibility. We have responsibility for the policy that we help develop and that policy should always be as good as the sacrifices of the men and women and their families. It should be worthy of those sacrifices.

But this was not about policy. This was about the right thing to do in regard to our men and women who we ask to defend this country. And if we can't get that right, then I don't know what we can get right. And if we can't do this in an honest, direct way, then we're going to have to go back and reevaluate everything.

So I think that not only was this a correct and responsible course of action and I was very pleased that I had a number of my Republican colleagues join me on this, but we will be back and I will be introducing later today, with a number of the people up here and with Republican colleagues, another similar amendment that Jim Webb and I introduced a couple of months ago.

So to the colleagues with me here and my Republican colleagues who put an appropriate focus on our people, I thank them. I think the American people do.

And the last point I would make, when you have veteran organizations, military institutions like the U.S. Officers Association, strongly in support of this, this tells you something. This is not about politics, ladies and gentlemen. This is about doing the right thing for the men and women that we ask to serve our country.

Thank you very much.

DURBIN: I want to thank Jim Webb and Chuck Hagel. Jim called me six weeks ago and said that he had been working on this amendment and wanted to offer it and the leadership felt that this was the most important amendment to offer first in this debate on the defense authorization bill.

What just happened on the floor of the Senate is wrong. It was wrong that the Webb-Hagel amendment did not pass. It was wrong that we didn't come to the aid of our warriors who are fatigued and exhausted by the redeployment after redeployment.

It was wrong that we didn't stand by the military families who sit at home in anticipation, prayerful anticipation of the next phone call, the next e-mail. It was wrong that so many members of the Senate who boast about supporting our troops wouldn't stand for our troops when the Webb-Hagel amendment gave us a chance.

But it was also wrong that the Republican leadership decided to put a procedural hurdle in our way. For the last two years, we have not had a single amendment offered on the defense authorization bill related to the defense authorization bill that has required a 60-vote margin.

But Senator McConnell yesterday decided it would be a 60-vote threshold, making it more difficult to pass any amendment, let alone one that might be controversial. The only exception in the last two years was an amendment related to minimum wage on the defense authorization bill, an unrelated issue, where, by unanimous consent, we agreed to 60 votes.

For those who are trying to follow all this arcane procedural description, let me make it simple. Mitch McConnell realized yesterday he couldn't win an up or down vote on the Webb-Hagel amendment and so he used his advantage under the Senate rules to require this majority of 60, which we couldn't reach. We had 56. I think we can reach 60.

I hope those who care for the military families and members of those military families will reach out to the Senators who did not support us, ask us to remember their heroes, their warriors who should be home resting and retraining and preparing for their next round of battle.

We're going to have another chance. I hope that it's during the debate on this bill. And I thank Senators Webb and Hagel for their leadership.

STABENOW: Today, a little bit earlier, Senator Reid and I joined a group of military families and veterans, a mom who lost her son in the war from Baltimore. They all asked us to join together to support this amendment and the majority of the Senate heard that today, 56 members.

This is not about whether or not this amendment can pass or did pass under the normal rules of the Senate. It's about whether or not the Senate Republican leadership is going to continue to use the rules to block what is the will of the majority of Americans and today, on this amendment, the majority of the Senators.

Tonight there'll be 1,644 members of the Michigan National Guard in Iraq, going to bed after a very long, hard day. Many of them have been deployed two times, three times, and too many for a fourth time now. And each one of them has a family at home worrying about what's going to happen, asking us to act.

This is about readiness. It's about giving them the downtime they need. It's about families. It's about putting our troops first who have given us the most in this war and we're going to continue until our troops and the American people are finally heard about what is happening.

MIKULSKI: I never thought that there would be a day in the United States Senate where I would be muzzled from speaking out and being able to vote on support for our troops.

I never thought there would be a day in the United States Senate where a vote to support our troops would be bogged down in parliamentary entanglements.

I never thought there would be a day when partisan politics would be so intense and prickly that the other party threw sand in the gears so that we could vote for a sensible amendment dealing with troop rotation offered by two combat veterans, Chuck Hagel and Jim Webb. Two combat veterans who know the stresses of war offered a sensible one for troop rotation, dealing with troop exhaustion and family fatigue.

This is what this amendment was about -- the opportunity to provide a rotation schedule that would enable our troops to come back home, to rest, to refresh and to retrain to answer the call of duty.

But, oh, no, we've got to play politics. We've got to talk about micromanagement. We have to get bogged down in constitutional debates.

Every day I check the temperature in Baghdad. It was 115 degrees yesterday. Every day I check it because I try to envision what our troops are up against. In all of that heat, with 100 pounds of body armor, patrolling the streets of Baghdad and being in Afghanistan and various other provinces, and I think about them and I think about the stresses they're under, being shot at, facing IEDs.

And I think of their spouses, I think of their mothers who are trying to cope with all that family stress, who are in acute traumatic stress. And I think about their children who, every time the news goes on and there's a bomb that goes off, they wonder if it's daddy or mommy.

But, oh, no, we have to have 60 votes to come up with dealing with that. Well, I say to our people if they think the temperature's hot in Baghdad, the temperature is rising here on the United States Senate floor.

Our men and women are fighting for majority rule. Why don't we give it to the Senate so that we can move ahead with dealing with this defense authorization? Let's deal with troop exhaustion. Let's deal with family fatigue and let's deal with the fact that people really want to support our troops.

This is the ultimate support our troop amendment.

BOXER: Barbara, I think you spoke so eloquently that all I have is a one minute line to add here.

Let's talk turkey about what just happened on the Senate floor. Except for a handful of Republicans, except for a handful, the Republicans in the United States Senate are desperately clinging to the status quo and this time they have gone too far.

This bipartisan amendment, which said to America, "We stand by our troops, we love our troops, we're going to make sure that they're rested and ready," was brought down because of politics, because of an administration that gave the orders to the loyal followers.

The American people want some independent thinking here in the United States Senate.

I want to thank Senators Webb and Hagel for their patriotism and for their leadership.

LINCOLN: Well, I, too, want to add my thanks to Senator Webb and Senator Hagel. The courageous devotion of our men and women in uniform is something that we all here, I think, think of every day.

I think Senator Mikulski did a tremendous job in trying to portray to you and to our constituents how we feel. Would you send your children to a playground with faulty equipment? Wouldn't you do everything you could to prepare them for the test that they had before them?

We are here to say that, yes, we're going to fight hard for all of what government can do, the needs that they have, the financial needs, whether it's health care needs, mental health care needs, equipment and everything. But what we want to say is these troops deserve the nurturing of their families, the rest and relaxation that only comes from being able to come home and to cry on the shoulder of a mother or a wife or a father.

And we've heard it from, again, as Senator Mikulski said, two veterans, Senator Webb and Senator Hagel, who know from their own experiences. This was a no brainer and it was an insult -- an insult for this to have been played in the political way that it was played.

I hope we'll come back at it again and I hope that the American people will help us make sure that those men and women who are in uniform and giving so courageously, that we can do all that we can to bring them home and not just that their American family can embrace them, but they can come home and be nurtured by their families and with the time that they need to rebuild and to refresh and retrain.

So I appreciate what they've done and the leadership of everyone here.

LAUTENBERG: I want to salute Jim Webb and Chuck Hagel for their comprehensiveness and their understanding of what it's like to be in the military and what it's like to be away from home, what it's like to be in harm's way.

And there was a film on TV the other night describing the equipment shortages and how things are wearing out and how they indicated our troops are wearing out. They're fatigued. They need rejuvenation. They need family reunification. And it is a humane way to treat our troops, to show them that we really do care about them, other than politic speak.

And so this is going to keep coming back and the result today was very interesting to me. Seven of our Republican friends voted with us and the rest were left squirming.

BROWN: This is the most disappointing vote in my first six months in the United States Senate. The president and almost three- fourths of Republican Senators have again betrayed our soldiers and our Marines and our veterans.

It started back in 2003 when Senator Menendez were in the House voting against the war, but were in the House fighting for body armor for our troops. The administration and Republican leaders didn't get proper body armor to our troops then. They're not taking care of returning soldiers and Marines now. They've not taken care of veterans in our hospitals, in veterans health care in our communities.

We're all going to keep fighting. We all appreciate the leadership of Senator Webb and Senator Hagel. This has just begun. We're going to change this policy.

MENENDEZ: Let me just say since I arrived here in the Senate about a year and a half ago, I have heard the refrain time and time again, "Support our troops. Don't undermine them. Support our troops."

And the essence of the vote today was a vote to support our troops. That was what the vote was all about. And to preserve the very essence of our security.

And today a Republican minority stopped the will of a majority of the United States Senate and, by virtue of that, a majority of the people of the United States who are living through the process through their families and neighbors of understanding the enormous wear and tear on the lives of the individuals who we call upon to protect the nation.

Never have so few been asked to do so much. And Senator Webb and Senator Hagel's amendment, two combat decorated veterans who understand fully the full atmosphere and conditions of war and understand the wear and tear on our men and women, and, in Senator Webb's case, on his son, who has served valiantly and continues to serve, understands fully that this is about the very essence of being able to preserve our security, of being able to continue to enlist people in the service of their country and to not grind this military into the ground.

So at a time in which we hear so much about support our troops, this was the opportunity to do so and it should have been more. We appreciate the, I believe, seven or so Republican votes that were cast, but it should have been more than those seven members of the Senate on the Republican side, who happen to be running for reelection. It should have been an overwhelming majority, far beyond the 60 votes even needed to end the filibuster, should have joined in support of the troops.

You know, supporting the troops is more than marching on Memorial Day or going to a Veterans' Day observance. It's how we take care of them in their health care. It's how we take care of them in their disabilities, how we take care of their families, for those who commit the ultimate sacrifice, and for the enlisted personnel serving across the globe, it is about how we take care of them in their ability to be able to perform on behalf of the nation and how we'll be able to sustain their families.

That's what Senator Webb's amendment was all about and to have used the procedural vote to stop that opportunity, to stand up for the troops, I think is the height of hypocrisy.

And I want to salute Senator Webb. I believe that if Americans speak out overwhelmingly, we will have another opportunity to bring this amendment back up again and that hopefully some will see the light as they get the heat back at home across the landscape of the country.

TESTER: First of all, Jim, thank you very much. I can just tell you I've been here for a little over six months. This is an outrage.

The fact that 56 Senators voted for this bill, voted for this amendment and the fact that it gets hung up in procedure is not why there's 100 Senators in the U.S. Senate doing the work that they need to do. And, quite honestly, it seems like when we come to important issues, where a majority of the Senators, and there's probably no more important issue than the Iraq war right now and troop readiness in that regard, and we get hung up with procedure because they want to delay the process.

The truth is -- and I don't want to put words in Senator Webb's mouth or Chuck Hagel's mouth, but the president's mismanaged this war from the beginning and this amendment wouldn't have been here if troop readiness would have been considered from the commander in chief of this country.

As I said before, this is an outrage. It's ridiculous. It's common sense. It should have been allowed to pass, which is what the majority of the people in the Senate wanted to have happen.

Thanks, Jim.

WEBB: Appreciate all of those comments. And just as a quick recap, and I'll take your questions, this was, on one level, a humane issue, an issue of military families, which has been well addressed by a number of people.

It's also a leadership issue in terms of how the senior leadership would be willing to step up, senior military leadership would be willing to step up and defend the wellbeing of their troops in an environment where this occupation has gone on for so long, and it's also a practical issue in terms of how the military is being used.

As I said on the floor, I spent three years as an assistant secretary of defense working on these manpower issues, working on mobilization, and we've reached the point where we just can't keep doing this.

And if we were simply wanting to be obstructionist or mischievous, we would have gone for the ideal, which is a two-to-one rotational cycle, in which the commandant of the Marine Corps himself said earlier this year he would like to see.

We were trying to create a minimum floor that would address the wellbeing of our troops while, at the same time, we are sorting out the missions that they're performing.

With that, I'll take your questions.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

WEBB: The surge is one of a whole series of operational scenarios that have been attempted during this four-year occupation. You know, clearly, if we want to be precise, in traditional terms, this war ended four years ago and we have had a very difficult occupation, as a number of people, including myself, have been attempting to get a diplomatic solution in place so we can remove our troops.

So to focus on the surge is not to focus on the reality of what's been happening in Iraq and what I've said again and again, and I've said it to the secretary of the Army and the deputy secretary of defense and others, is that we have reached a point after four years where the operational policies in Iraq have to take into account the availability of the troops. You can't keep doing this the other way around.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

MURRAY: I can't speak to what action will happen in the House, but I can tell you, here in the Senate, we have really focused on troops and support for troops in terms of making sure that they have the equipment, supplies, everything they need to do what's been asked of them, whether or not we supported this war to begin with.

And the Webb amendment today was part of a very long-term effort to make sure that the men and women who serve us are adequately prepared, trained and supported when they come home.

Later this afternoon, we will likely take up another amendment on this bill, the wounded warriors amendment, that is a result of our VA Committee and our Armed Services Committee coming together to deal with the gaps that our soldiers between when they are in the service and separated and going to the VA in terms of not having systems that talk to each other, too many people being left in medical hold, and really addressing strongly that troop support and veteran support issue that we have.

This is not going to stop us from continuing our work to make sure that we take care of the men and women who serve us. But it is deeply disappointing that the Senate Republicans today hid behind a procedural move that would have allowed us to make sure those men and women are supported.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

MURRAY: Look, I think where the pressure is in this country is from the thousands of families across this country who daily face the issue of their spouse or their father or one of their kids who are off at war and who are here and seeing personally the impact on them and their families.

And we are going to continue, every one of us who go home every weekend, as I do, to see those families and the tears in their eyes and asking us to please be there to truly support them, and I think that national pressure is going to continue to stay on the Senate and hopefully be able to lead us to a 60-vote margin on this amendment and on others.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

WEBB: Senator Hagel and I introduced a broader amendment during the supplemental appropriations bill that took into account actual troop rotation cycles and these sorts of things.

Just to emphasize, what I attempted to do in this amendment today was to strip things down to the most crucial issue for troop wellbeing, to try to get a vote on one clear issue that really is standing out.

It's almost unheard of for an amendment like this to get the overt support of groups like the Military Officers of America, 368,000 military officers of all different services stepping forward and saying, "We need to do this as an issue of stewardship" or the leadership of the United States government towards the people.

So this issue, the one that was before us today, should not have been dealt with politically at all. You could address this issue without even having to get into the right or the wrong of the Iraq war or whether we want to be there for seven more weeks or seven more years.

It's simply how do you take care of your troops in rotational cycles that have now been going on for four years.

I can take one more question and then we have to wrap this up. Yes, sir?

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

WEBB: As I understand, he was talking about a gut instinct and I would hope that someone who's a director of homeland security would have something else to offer us if he's going to be talking like that.

Thank you very much.

END

Source: Senator Jim Webb