Too often, we as members of Congress go about our lives disconnected from the reality of the sacrifices our service members and their families make every day to protect our republic and way of life. Yesterday, we were confronted with distressing images of thousands of national guardsmen sleeping on the cold cement floor of the Senate’s underground parking garage with scant resources — as one report put it, with a single bathroom and a single power outlet. This wasn’t a forward operating base in the Afghan mountains; it was in the heart of our nation’s capital. Many of us are rightfully outraged and want answers about what led to this decision.

But while this treatment of our troops by Congress is rightly jarring, it cannot be that surprising. Rather, it is typical of how Congress has been treating America’s troops for over a decade, and this outrage should serve as a sobering wake-up call for us in Congress to finally do our constitutional duty to debate where we send them.