has been threatened by iranian leaders. israel and the united states share an unwavering commitment to keeping iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. it is unfortunate that criticism from the obama administration surrounded the prime minister's earlier visit. meanwhile, the world is not safer, global threats continue to multiply, posing complex challenges to america's national security issues. one looks at the unrest around the world and it is easy to see how america is failing to lead. another member of this administration director of national intelligence james clapper, underscored the widespread instability when he testified before the senate armed services committee last month. it's important to compare director clapper's testimony with that of the secretary of state earlier.

director clapper our director of national intelligence, said there are more deaths are from state-sponsored mass killings, more people displaced from their homes and a higher rate of political instability last year than we've seen in decades. in fact, 2014 was the most lethal year on record for terrorism. we are now facing unpredictable instability as the new normal, according to this administration 's director of national intelligence. the white house foreign policy team however seems unwilling to accept these harsh truths. listen to the words of secretary of state john kerry our chief negotiator with iran. he said in contrast to the words of our director of national intelligence secretary kerry said we are actually living in a period of less daily threat to americans and to people in the world than normally, less

deaths less violent deaths today than throughout the last century. it's hard to square the testimony of our chief negotiator with iran with the words of our director of national intelligence. particularly troubling is the administration's past reliance on empty promise, promises from adversaries. under president obama's watch vladimir putin has invaded and annexed part of ukraine continued to support the brutal regime of syrian dictator bashar al-assad and violented the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty. on february 27, we saw yet another troubling development in moscow. opposition leader boris nemtsov was gunned down on the street after dinner in a secure, well-protected part of moscow just steps away from the

kremlin. the russian government has denounced mr. nemtsov's assassination, but this is not the first time one of putin's critics has been murdered. i will only note nemtsov is only the latest in the latest of critics who have met their demise over time and russia's shameful disregard for human rights continues. in conclusion, american leadership is of the utmost importance to stability at this time. director clapper was frank when he said -- and i quote -- "unpervasive uncertainty makes it harder to predict the future" -- unquote which is why we must remain vigilant. america can succeed if we demonstrate the fortitude and resolve necessary to defend freedom and stop those who threaten it. this includes taking an honest

look at iran's past and present behavior before we cut a deal that we will later regret. thank you mr. president. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. mccain: i ask unanimous consent to address the senate as if in morning business and engage in a colloquy with the senator from south carolina. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mccain: mr. president first of all i want to make reference to the letter, the famous letter by senator cotton to the iranians conveying to them the realities of the united states constitution and the situation as it will prevail hopefully, and that is that the congress of the united states must ratify any agreement between the united states and iran and anybody that says we shouldn't ignores history and ignores the impact of this treaty. i signed that letter and i believe that it is a direct

result of the president's statement that he would veto any role that the united states congress should play in the ratification or nonratification of a pending agreement. and that is what triggered the letter from senator cotton and that's why i stand by it. 71% of the americans believe negotiations with tehran will not make a difference in preventing iran from producing nuclear weapons. mr. president, 71% of the american people are right. now, i'd like to talk with my friend from south carolina about the situation in iraq today specifically the role that iran is playing and even more specifically the combat that's taking place around the city of tikrit. tikrit is the hometown of saddam hussein. tikrit is a sunni strong hold. tikrit is now under attack, the isis people who are occupying it

by shia militia including specifically the ba dump r brigades and are led by iranians trained by iranians and an individual named sol ammani who is the head of the revolutionary guard is now the most visible leader. solomani is the same guy that sent copper-tipped i.e.d.'s into iraq which killed hundreds of american soldiers and marines. we now are somehow accommodating the individual who was responsible for the deaths of brave young americans. that is not only unbelievable, it is totally unacceptable. and the question is, when the shia militias get into tikrit, how are they going to behave? there are well-documented human rights abuses by the shia militias and again mr. president, this is the same brigades we fought against in

the battle of sadr city during the surge and now -- and now the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff said in january -- and i quote -- "as long as the iraqi government remains committed to incluesivity of all the groups inside the country then i think iranian influence will be positive." i am not making that up. instead -- an a.p. story today i'd like to quote from entitled little progress in key plank of obama anti-isis struggle. quote -- "instead of reaching out to sunnis the iraqi government has bolstered close ties to iran and militias accused of massacring sunnis, u.s. officials acknowledge. the iraqi military's reliance on shiite militias to take tikrit has complicated the prospects of

political reconciliation, experts say. human rights watch said in a march 4 report it has documented numerous atrocities against sunni civilians by the shiite militias. they see it as a persian invasion of the soupy heartland says a former case officer with long middle east experience who travels frequently to iraq. and then my friends, i would be interested in my friend from south carolina's reaction to this. after meeting with demps -- the body, dempsey told reporters he was given firm assurances that the shiite government is committed to reconciling. asked whether they were credible defensive said they seemed credible today. dempsey noted during his helicopter flight over baghdad he saw worrisome signs of

iranian influence. he spotted a plethora of flags at check points and elsewhere in the capital. only one of which happened to be the iraqi flag, he said, alluding to the banners of iranian-backed shiite militias. can we get real, i ask my friend from south carolina, as to what is taking place now the iranians are now in sanaa they're in baghdad and beirut and damascus and meanwhile this president and secretary of state pursue the mirage of a nuclear agreement that will somehow change the entire equation and i'd be interested in his views of what the saudis are doing which is accommodating in their own way and possibly making plans to acquire their own nuclear weapons along with other nations in the middle east. mr. are graham: just to sum it up our foreign policy is in a

free-for-all and it's incompetent in its core. no one can feel good about shia-led groups going in some tikrit with iranian command and control. if you know anything about iraq to hope -- the hope for iraq is for the seanies -- sunnis the shias and the kurds is to accommodate each others' interests and to work together. so when you see a shia-led effort against as you said, the sunni stronghold with iranian commander on the ground that was responsible for killing americans, and we think that's a good day for us, that's nuts. that's a bad day for america. now, let's just talk a little bit about the iranian nuclear

negotiations. i did not sign senator cotton's letter until the president threatened to veto congressional legislation to make sure that we would have a say about relieving the sanctions we created. when president obama told the congress a bipartisan group was being formed, to make sure that congress would have a say about relieving the sanctions that we created that i will veto your efforts to have a say, then all bets were off at that point for me. so i want the iranians to know in case they're listening obama administration, the b 5 plus 1 the u.n., cannot relieve congressional sanctions without our approval. i don't know what kind of system you have in iran, i'm pretty well sure it's not democratic, and to president obama when you indicated that the letter that was written open letter

to the ayatollahs about congress' insistence that we have a say about sanctions we created, you said you've empowered the hardliners. all i can say is that the president of the united states believes there is a hard-line and moderate split in iran, i want to look at the deal now more than ever. please name the moderate elements that are in the government in iran. and if these people are moderate god forbid that the hardliners ever get in charge. the idea that there is a split is ridiculous. the president of iran, the foreign minister of iran are playing the oldest game in the middle east. the moderates were gunned down in 2009. i can show you a moderate, it was the young lady that was killed in the streets. every moderate voice was crushed by force of arms, and our president in 2009 sat on the sidelines because he didn't want to disrupt his chance to reach

an agreement with the ayatollahs. mr. president, you scare me when you say you believe there's a moderate element in charge of iran. look what they're doing as you negotiate regarding their nuclear ambitions. they have taken down a pro-american government in yemen that allowed us a platform to watch and attack al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. the terrorist organization responsible for the attack in paris. the huthis were then able to take down the government in. the iranians are supporting assad, who was killed -- has killed 220,000 of his own people and the instability from assad's brutality is putting the king of jordan and everyone else at risk. over a million syrians have left

syria to go to lebanon and jordan. that's not a moderate regime mr. president. moderate regimes do not support insurgencies that through the force of arms take down elected governments. hezbollah, mr. president, is not a moderate voice in lebanon. they're supported by the iranians. they've had a record of attacking israel and killing us for decades. so mr. president iran's support of hezbollah, of the huthis and of assad that's not what moderate people do. now, in iraq itself, mr. president, the shia militia that are roaming around iraq are committing war crimes as i speak. so you are completely disconnected from the behavior of the people you're negotiating with and you don't understand the iranians at all.

you are dangerously in denial or delusional about the threats we face and who we're dealing with. so i'm glad we wrote the letter to bring some certainty to the process. if the president of the united states negotiates a deal with iran and that deal includes lifting the congressional sanctions, and he does it without our input he has changed a balance of power that's existed for hundreds of years in this country. mr. president, we created congressional sanctions by a 100-0 vote over your objection and we're not going to let you tell us we have no voice in lifting the sanctions we've created. we're not going to let the united nations lift sanctions that we created so the iranians need to understand the following. if there is a deal between the p 5-plus 1 and they are telling you congressional sanctions will be lifted by signing the deal,

that's not accurate. they won't be lifted unless we agree. i would vote to lift sanctions if i thought we had a good deal. i would vote against a bad deal because a bad deal would start a nuclear arms race in the middle east. so senator mccain, to sum this up. i have never been more worried than i am today about what's happening in the middle east. you have people in our military celebrate iranian ground activity in iraq that will expand sectarian conflict. when the iranians are marching on tikrit, that's not a sign that iraq is coming together. and to anybody on the american side who believes that's a good idea man what movie have you been watching? to the president of the united states we're going to insist off a say about sanctions we created before you can negotiate their relief. i'm sorry you may not like that you may find us inconvenient but we have a say too. and the bill that we're talking about only deals with the

sanctions we've created. so i hope my democratic colleagues who are so disappointed will understand why we, at least on this side, are pretty offended at the idea that the president can negotiate away sanctions we have created without our input. you should be equally worried. now, the israelis and the arabs have told us one thing -- iran is the most destabilizing force in the middle east, and this president and this administration negotiates a nuclear deal without saying a word about the havoc iran is creating on the ground. if i were president i would tell the iranians, we're not going to talk to you any more about your nuclear ambitions until you stop destabilizing the region and invading your neighbors. we're not going to talk to you about your nuclear ambitions until you stop building icbm's that can threaten us, until you stop sponsoring terrorist

organizations. but not only has the president remained silent about iran's wreaking havoc throughout the region, he is negotiating a deal, at least from what i have been able to find out about it, that is a north korea in the making and he wants us to be silent. to my democratic colleagues and to the president we're not going to be silent. we're going to have a say. we're going to have a vote. and i hope in a bipartisan fashion, we will vote a good deal in and a bad deal down. under the construct you've got to get 60 votes to disapprove the deal so republicans alone cannot kill it. if it is a good deal, you will know it. it will be a deal that gives the iranians what they say they want a peaceful nuclear power program. a bad deal is a deal that will allow them to have a nuclear weapon one day and the only thing between a nuclear weapon, us and israel is the united nations. forget that. that's what we had in north korea. so senator mccain -- mr. mccain: could i ask my friend if he recalls the recent

testimony by henry kissinger probably the most highly regarded individual in america today. he voiced his concern and his fundamental problem was that, as he put it, he had gone from negotiations to rid iran from ever having the capability of developing nuclear weapons to delaying. so that on its face -- and again, i want to remind my friend from south carolina, he and i and our beloved friend, former member of this body, joe lieberman, made visit after visit after visit to baghdad and to iraq. we probably were everywhere in that country on many occasions. and how well we remember the fight that the surge brought on to bring stability to iraq, and it did bring stability. and do you remember the battle of sadr city? who was it that our forces, our young men and women were

fighting against? the badr brigades. guess who is fighting in tikrit today? the badr brigades. you and i have seen horrific -- we have been to walter reed and many other places and seen our wounded. wounded by what? the copper tipped i.e.d.'s that solameni made sure went into iraq that wreaked havoc and killed so many americans. it is now solameni who is visibly leading the fight in tikrit. and strangely enough, our chairman of the joint chiefs of staff saw so many flags that, guess what, with the banners of the iranian backed shia militias. so i just would ask my friend isn't this in some ways a greek tragedy? isn't this in some ways a

situation where we sacrifice so much and thanks to the inexpired, fantastic leadership of general petraeus and colonel mcfarland and all of those individuals that fought so well and led so well, that we had it won, it was stabilized, and now because of the president's decision not to leave a residual force, we are seeing capitals of -- in the middle east, whether it be baghdad beirut or damascus, we are now seeing an overwhelming iranian presence who are dedicated among other things, to the extinction of the state of israel. mr. graham: well, all i can say is to the soldiers and to the military personnel who participated in the iraq fight you did your job. presidentpresident bush made mistakes. to his credit, he adjusted.

he made a lot of mistakes up front, but he did adjust because the surge did work. president obama was dealt a pretty good hand when it came to iraq. things were better on the security front. economic and political progress was well noted. his decision not to leave a residual force behind has come back to haunt us, iraq and the entire region, and it was his decision. we try to blame the iraqis. that's just rewriting history. when he decided to turn down the entire recommendation of his national security team the national security team's entire recommendation about doing a no-fly zone and helping the free syrian army a few years ago everything senator mccain said about that decision has come true. radical islamists filled in that vacuum. so what you see in the middle east is the result of bad policy choices, but what you see today is the beginning of the worst decision, which would be a bad

deal with iran in dealing congress out. so to the american people, here's one thing i promise you. we and the congress in a bipartisan fashion will make sure that any deal, if there is one negotiating with the iranians will come to this body to be openly debated so you will know what's in it and every member of this senate is going to take a vote as to whether or not it's good enough to lift congressional sanctions that we created. i promise you we're not going to allow the most historic decision any president will make any time soon to go without checks and balances. it will come to this body, we will have a vote. and i promise you this -- if this administration believes there is a hard-line moderate split between those who govern iran it should scare you because it scares me. given what senator mccain has described, do you really believe there is a moderate element in

iran? so i hope that we can reach a diplomatic conclusion to the iranian nuclear ambitions. they have been lying about their nuclear program for 20 years. i would like to see a good deal, but i will insist on voting on a deal that relieves congressional sanctions. and to the germans our friends in germany, i will end with this senator mccain. the foreign minister of germany said that the letter empowered the iranians. with all due to our german allies that is the most ridiculous statement i think i've ever heard. requiring a deal between the iranians involving congressional sanctions to come back to the congress should not embolden anybody. i don't know if the deal you're negotiating goes to the parliament in germany but we do things a certain way. and the efforts of the french and the germans to discipline

putin, how well has that turned out? you have got a group of nations trying to deal with the most thuggish regime in the world acting like the keystone kops, in my opinion. mr. mccain: could i remind my friend, it is the same german foreign minister who criticized us who sat by and watched the dismemberment of a european nation for the first time in 70 years, the same foreign minister who keeps threatening vladimir putin if he keeps this up, and vladimir putin continues his aggression and will continue his aggression as well. i can't give up the floor without mentioning again my sorrow at the passage of -- and murder of my friend boris nemtsov, and the recent arrests by vladimir putin's crack law

enforcement team is reminiscent and they rounded up some chechnyans is reminiscent of everybody's favorite film "casablanca" where at the end claude raine says round up the usual suspects. we have seen a scene from that movie again as the russians have rounded up the usual suspects. under this regime in russia, we will never know who the murders are of boris nemtsov and that, my friends, is a tragedy. mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. mr. sullivan: mr. president i rise today to support the justice for victims of trafficking act. the presiding officer: the senate is in a quorum call. mr. sullivan: can we advice rate the quorum call? -- can we viserate the quorum call? the presiding officer: without objection. the senator from alaska may proceed. mr. sullivan: mr. president today i rise to support the justice for victims of trafficking act and i want to commend the numerous senators, senators cornyn, klobuchar so many others who have worked so hard to move this act forward. now, i realize that there are many of us who are new to this body and i certainly am still learning my way around the procedural maze here.

however, it is easy to see how frustrating this maze can be and how it keeps us from getting good things done for the people who elected us and sent us here. last year, i traveled my state alaska and one of the top concerns i heard from alaskans is that they were tired of the gridlock and they want to see a functioning government and an open process in the united states senate, so here we are on a bill that is of immense importance to the country and to alaska, a bill that has very broad bipartisan support and it comes to the floor with the promise of an open amendment process so all senators can be heard, and yet a few of my friends on the other side of the aisle are preventing us from

moving forward on a bill that will protect some of the nation's most vulnerable citizens. evidently, a provision in the bill that has been the law of the land for decades has now become an excuse among some not to move the bill forward. mr. president, that's a shame for the country and particularly for the victims who have been snared in the heinous world of human trafficking. as a former attorney general of the great state of alaska, i have seen the horrible pain and suffering that human trafficking and cases of domestic violence and sexual assault can cause among our fellow citizens. now, i hail from a great state. we are proud alaskans, proud of many things that are wonderful about our state but like most states, we have problems. we have some of the highest rates of sexual abuse and exploitation in the country and

human trafficking is a big problem in my state just as it is throughout the rest of the country. since the human trafficking bill was placed on the calendar, i have been working closely with all of my colleagues, not only on this bill but on an amendment that i plan on introducing with many others, the mann act cooperation amendment. this is an amendment that would be a rare thing in washington today, a truly win-win amendment for the federal government, state governments and most importantly, victims of human trafficking. now, human trafficking is a problem that unfortunately comes in many forms and in many states all states. in fact, in all corners of our nation. and in order to best combat human trafficking we must work towards a seamless federal and state partnership in order to stop this growing