And making sure the process works. Senator rubio when people know each other it makes it harder to hate each other. We are an organization together, a Prayer Breakfast but you have disagreement but you like them as a person. You just dont know how they voted or bumper stickers and know them as a father, mother, neighbor, someone who did you favor and that is always important. In the senate that happens. Committees are smaller and you have to make a point of seeking it. I dont know if we are going to get back that everyone lives in washington and goes on vacations. Are you but you need to have that level of cooperation and know each other. You may not agree on 910 things but agree on things you have common interest on. The most coveted thing is a bipartisan cosponsor and makes the bill more attractive and easier to pass. In my case, there was a time when senator cardin were passing so many bills together. They would call me cardin and rubio. And that happens and citizens will tell you, committees you are on, interest of your state or particular interest. Senator coons there is a subject that has earned a lot more attention than recent months because of who lives in the white house and some of the people that you serve with. And i want to quote one of your colleagues, senator romney. He called the u. S. Senate, quote, a club for old men. The average age in the senate is 63. You are under average in that regard. Senator rubio you are 52. In your view senator coons, how old is too old to serve in the u. S. Senate . Senator coons less than a matter of years than capability. I had a debate on the senate floor about a decade ago about term limits and there is a basic difference of having a term limit and this is what elections are for. The elect rate elect rate should say they are seasoning their relationships and make them a strong legislator. Over the course of the 13 years we have served together we have seen folks younger than us who perhaps didnt succeed at the job and much older than us that passed landmark legislation together. I think it is hard to say this is the age limit, 65 and mandatory retirement. Capacity is in front of us all the time. I look back the last two years and the most legislatively accomplished. The bipartisan accomplishments of the last congress exceeded anything in the last 30 years. And no small part from the seasoning and capability of some of the folks who serve in the senate. You wouldnt put a number on it . Senator coons i wouldnt. Senator rubio it has to deal. Chuck dprasly knows everything what is happening. I dont think that number is age specific. It is more about a capacity driven thing. And i do think there comes a time for all of us you have to ask why you still doing the job and takes certain level of passion to do it well. When you are no longer excited about doing the job and achieving things. That is a moment to reflect why you are still there. I decided what quiem going to do and move on. I think that is a big part of it. But i dont think you can put a number or an age on it for say where we have people significant people doing extraordinary things and do the job. Senators who represent states with large retiree populations. Senator rubio many of whom are still voting well into that their 90s. There are proposals for a state to allow a temporary replacement if someone is going to be out for a while. Would you consider Something Like that . Senator coons the state legislature should make and depends on the state and the reasons they would be taking it up. There are many different ways of filling vacancies as state. Senator rubio a temporary. That sounds kind of weird. There is a real inconsistency. New person is appointed, how is he going to sign any bills and what about the work you did. I would hope that people who love me and would encourage them and generally people get that way for the most part and none of us control one day or doing great with health and next day something can happen in your lives to change that dynamic. I heard about a member of the house and not running for reelection because of a diagnosis and its a tough one. But i actually did you make that one up . No. No. What do you think about the floridians. I have to go through my brain. You have the sitting governor. Senator rubio when President Trump was president , public policy. Child tax credit expansion wasnt high as i wanted it to be. I think some of the policies. We have significant reference. And i live in a state that governor desantis. Thats not what florida is. So, and there are tim scott is one of my closest friends. He has a strong message. And nikki haley did a good job at the u. N. And they provide strong choices. One of the reasons why i dont think what senators think about primaries. And these are the highly watched races and Republican Voters will choose a nominee and go from there. If President Biden wins another term and secretary of state Anthony Blinken opts to leave, what qualities should the next secretary of state possess . Senator coons he should stand at least 6 feet tall and a full head of hair. I have Great Respect for secretary blinken and National Security and Foreign Policy team and he is entitled to pick whoever he wants. I asked for his guidance how i best could contribute to this administration and he said stay in the senate and craft bipartisan bills. Thats the task i put myself to. And if you look at the last two years, the outcome has been positive. I was saddened to read the piece omit romney and why he is retiring from the senate. And whoever is the next president and i have a strong favorite, our current president , that he will be served by a cabinet that has the understanding and knowledge how to move legislation in the congress. We are dpriending down to on confirm ambassadors, judges and pass legislation. At home in delaware, its my hope we have a next congress and next administration that is committed to our erm role in the world, law. And to democracy. The at the end of the day only count committed to liberty and justice and i dont want to see this experiment end. If he calls . Ill consider it. Senator rubio if he offers it to me, i will not serve under President Biden. If he is nominated, never mind. Closing arguments. Senator rubio i appreciate you hosting this. I do believe the question is in a political realignment. I actually think at the end of the day we are much more polla rised. But i think it is an important moment to understand. You cant go back to the past future is inevitable. With the first is that nation matters. Our job before anything else is do what is in the best interest in america. But i think a good and Strong America is good for the world and that includes having an economy that expects ablebodied people to work and dignified ann people that at least sustain a family and contribute to families and things that are critical. Being tested on the International Stage and not just tested on Foreign Policy or military projections but how we perform and baiive here at home because people watch what is happening in america, january 6 or debates that happens in our politics and influences our policies. Senator coons said this earlier, our adversaries, particularly china keep telling people, america is a hollowed out nation in decline. Look at their political process how dysfunctional it is, how can you rely on them to come to your defense. We have to be cognizant of that and at the same time that there are people are and thats real and give it a voice and hope we can build a governing consensus. A little bit to the left and right and soviet union and marxism needed to be defeated. It is going to be a lot of work and i appreciate the chance to model how some of those conversations would go. And this is the example of the things we can achieve together if we give it a shot. Senator coons. Senator coons let me tell you a story about three different women. When we were first elected and came to washington, didnt know each other. Marco was high profile National Figure that had been catta polted and i defeated someone. I was the more accidental senator. But within our first week here, one person, adrian who graduated from the same high school and Business Leader texted both of us and said get to know that other idea and we both literally went him. She texted him and purposed us until we started talking together and produced that first bill. We need others outside of circles to distract us to push us together and i seen that add dry and had both cells phones and get inside our lives and circles. I have a dear departed grandmother who was conservative. And she said dont forget your pay stubs as legislator, i want to know you are doing it. And every time you cash it you are paid by the taxpayers to do that job and it is my hope out of this discussion tonight we will go back to legislating together. We were supporting israel and chinas Human Rights Violations and investments in science and technology and hope well do nor. I went to the National Constitution center when they were giving the Liberty Medal to the late john mccain and my friend joe biden and spoke longer than senator mccain in introducing him and senator mccain delivered a remarkable speech. If you havent watched it, it is a love letter to america. It was striking and i said to my wife how tragic that this incredible generation of senators is passing and they knew each other and knew each other spouses and stayed in each others home but they disagreed and trusted each other and each was a patriot. And my wife wouldnt let me wallow in that moment. She said thats your job, buster. She said go find republican friends and partners invite them to delaware and go to their home state and work with them, 10 to 20 years some americans would look at the two of you how inspiring to have such two different senators willing to on legislate together. Thats why im here tonight. Democracy is a verb and has to be an active verb and only remains a democracy if we do it together. [applause] our thanks to senator coons and senator rubio. They are going to do a lot of other things tonight. Hopefully we provided that nudge that senator coons and this reporter is glad we can participate. And thanks to the bipartisan policy center, edward m. Kennedy institute and orin Hatch Institute and thanks to George Washington hosting us tonight. Thanks for watching. Good night. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2023] captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Orgmy name is justm the director of defense and Foreign Policy studies at cato. It is my pleasure to welcome you, in this form, an uncommonly formal august afternoon in washington, to our forum on proposals for using u. S. Military at the border to counter fentanyl. You will hear a lot of reasons this afternoon why proposals for using the u. S. Military in and around mexico to counter fentanyl is a bad idea. It is important to state at the outset that there is an underlying crisis happening in the u. S. Overdose deaths and precise data are hard to come by. As we can tell, somewhere on the order of 60 and 80,000 americans per year, last year in 2022, are dying of fentanyl related overdoses. Provisional data from the cdc suggested there were more than 70,000 fentanyl Overdose Deaths in the country last year. So, there is a real underlying crisis happening in the u. S. , that helps to explain why politicians have begun to latch onto the problem. June, nbc news poll, they illustrated the public is quite anxious about this problem. Respondents were asked whether a president ial candidate who supported deploying the u. S. Military to the Mexican Border to stop Illegal Drugs from entering the country would make someone more or less likely to vote for that candidate. Speaking of the public, it made people it made 55 of people more likely to vote for such a candidate. Only 29 of people less likely to vote for such a candidate. Speaking about republicans, 86 of people were more likely to vote for a candidate who favored deploying u. S. Military to the border, to counter drugs. Only 6 of republicans were more likely to oppose a candidate. You have a real underlying crisis happening in the u. S. You have politicians groping around at solutions. Just because something is marketed as a real solution to a real problem, does not mean it is a real solution, to a real problem. I think that is the right way to set up the discussion we are about to have this afternoon. I am very pleased to have what i think is a panel of diverse experts that get at this problem from different angles. Uncommonly, i think they will flow from your left, to your right. Brian is the Senior Advisor for the u. S. Program at the International Crisis group, and a nonresident senior fellow at the rightcenter of law and security at nyu law school. He served as attorney advisor the u. S. State Departments Office of the legal advisor. His work on u. S. Foreign policy appeared in forte affairs, policy foreign affair policies, just security. Hes going to comment on some of the legal aspects of the proposals, particularly in congress for using the military and cartels. Lupe, is a school at teacher at george mason diversity, her Research Includes organized crime and u. S. mexico relations. She is the author of criminal corporation, energy and civil war in mexico. She is working on a book project about human trafficking. She has a ba in economics, her na in Political Science from the new school for social research. Finally, we will hear from jeff singer, my colleague, where he is a senior fellow of health policies. He is the founder of surgical clinics in phoenix, arizona. He is a physician by trade. He has practiced general surgery for more than 40 years. In march, he testified before the House Committee on crime and surveillance and the role that prohibition has paid played in the fentanyl crisis. He earned a ba at brooklyn college. I think it is probably best to start off by asking brian to talk about we have heard from republican president ial candidates, that we will be tough and use the military against the cartels, but not a lot of details and those proposals. We have at least three pieces of legislation wending their way through capitol hill that involve, or at least adjacent to use of the military, for these cartels, can you talk a bit about what, if any powers with those grant the government for using the military, and what the implications of these legislations would have . Thanks for having me here. It is a pleasure to be here. Let me preface my remarks by noting that because the illegal guardrails from the unilateral use of force by the president are weak, it is not necessary that Congress Enacts any additional legislation for the president to be able to wield the military against cartels in mexico. Bear in mind. Youre selecting both the scale of the fentanyl crisis and also its political assailants, it is 145 pieces of legislation being introduced in this congress that refer to fentanyl. They cover topics of strengthening criminal penalties to increased border control, to Harm Reduction, i will focus on measures that have been introduced, that frame the war on drugs on an act as an actual war and propose either use of military force or militarized approaches to capturing fentanyl. The most extreme of these is the amf cartel introduced by dan crenshaw, representative of florida. This is a real deal war authorization cut and pasted from the 2001 authorization use of military force. This measure reproduces many of the pathologies of that war on terror authorization. It would give the president the authority to use appropriate force against a list of named Drug Trafficking organizations in mexico. Also, to add additional groups against whom the president can use force. Because this authorization is so broad, the president would have the authority to launch new wars against organizations in mexico potentially even mexico state itself. There is also, right out of the House Affairs committee, the project precursor act, which would direct the secretary of state fentanyl as a chemical weapon to add fentanyl as a chemical weapon. Lindsey graham has introduced a measure that would designate Drug Trafficking organizations as foreign terrorist organizations. Theres also measures introduced that would direct the homeland of security to designate fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction. Earlier this year biden received a letter from 18 states attorney generals making similar requests that fentanyl be labeled as a weapon of mass destruction. The prospect for any of these measures becoming law, being enacted is pretty dim. Its not it will have to pass in congress. The administration shows no interest in signing this into law. The danger in the framing and measures that cast the war on drugs and cast the use of military force as appropriate policy tools is likely on the campaign trails. Doing drone strikes, blockades, shooting suspected drug traffickers. They have normalized the ideas that using military force is an appropriate policy response to the crisis. They make it more likely that a future president will actually use that authority. The president does not need Additional Authority given the week guardrails he has. They will normalize the notion that this is the future of the white house to rely upon. I will do my best to keep this from becoming the representative crenshaw show. Theres a lot that he has done with this policy. He has done again an authorization for the use of military force. It has very clear parallels to the 2001 authorization of the use of military force. I am going to read you a quote. He has d