WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today joined MSNBC’s Morning Joe to discuss U.S. missile strikes in Syria and the ramifications of the Senate Republicans’ utilization of the 'nuclear option'.

“One of my real hopes is that the steps taken by President Trump and the significant challenges facing us in the world will bring us together. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee operates in a fairly bipartisan way and has strong bipartisan leadership, and one of the unintended consequences of a Trump presidency may be to make the Senate great again. In Foreign Relations, we can and should step up to our Constitutional role to insist on a declaration of war and an authorization of the use of military force and to help shape strategy, because frankly there is no clear strategy right now for how we're going to both confront Assad and defeat ISIS,” said Senator Coons.

Full audio and video available here.

Excerpts from the interview:

Senator Coons on the nuclear option: I think this was a sad day for the Senate, and each party has a deeply felt sense of grievance. Democrats feel that Judge Merrick Garland was badly mistreated and that seven months of denial of a hearing or a vote was the equivalent of a partisan filibuster. Republicans are deeply aggrieved that Judge Gorsuch was the subject of a partisan filibuster and the resolution is that the opportunity for any future filibusters is now gone against Supreme Court nominees. 

Senator Coons on future filibusters and nominees: I spent time in the last two weeks with a dozen senators, both Republicans and Democrats, trying to come to an agreement, similar to what the gang of 14 was able to do. Susan Collins was a terrific partner in doing this work and, on my side, Senators Bennet and King. In the end, we just don't have enough trust at this point for us to be able to get past this point. What I'm hopeful we'll see today and over the next couple of weeks is a strong bipartisan commitment to defend the legislative filibuster, the thing that makes the Senate the Senate and not the House. 

More on the filibuster: That’s something Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon has been advocating for and he just demonstrated this week exactly how painful it could be.  He did a 15-hour filibuster, held the floor the entire night. It would be something that many members of the Senate would then hesitate to ever invoke cloture or prevent cloture. 

Senator Coons on US strategy in Syria: One of my real hopes is that the steps taken by President Trump and the significant challenges facing us in the world will bring us together. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee operates in a fairly bipartisan way and has strong bipartisan leadership, and one of the unintended consequences of a Trump presidency may be to make the Senate great again. In Foreign Relations, we can and should step up to our Constitutional role to insist on a declaration of war and an authorization of the use of military force and to help shape strategy, because frankly there is no clear strategy right now for how we're going to both confront Assad and defeat ISIS.

Senator Coons on whether the House Intelligence Committee has a chance to regain its credibility: I'm hopeful that that's what's going to happen. There are members of the House Intelligence Committee I spoke with, too, yesterday, who recognize that, their role in oversight, that their role as an equal chamber of the Congress with the Senate was really compromised by Congressman Nunes. And so I think they're eager to step forward and demonstrate they can be responsible. I'm encouraged by how the Senate Intelligence Committee is progressing in a bipartisan way. Frankly, many of my colleagues have already called for a newly created independent commission or a special committee. That would take us off track for six months while legislation is passed, new staff is put in place, new procedures set up. I think we need to focus on the functioning committee that we have, the Senate Intelligence Committee that's making progress in this important investigation to get to the bottom of all the allegations about potential coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia in the interference in our last election. 

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