[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 14 (Sunday, January 21, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S396-S397]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, we now enter day 2 of the first real 
government shutdown ever to take place when one party controlled the 
Presidency, the House, and the Senate. Under this unified control, it 
was the Republicans' job to govern. It was their job to lead. It was 
their job to reach out to us and come up with compromise. They have 
failed.
  Our democracy was designed to run on compromise. The Senate was 
designed to run on compromise. We are no dictatorship subject to the 
whims of an Executive, just as we are not a one-party system, where the 
winner of an election gets to decide everything and the minority 
nothing.
  We are a government that can only operate if the majority party--the 
governing party--accepts and seeks compromise.
  The majority, however, has forgotten the lessons of the Founding 
Fathers. They have shown they do not know how to compromise. Not only 
do they not consult us, they can't even get on the same page with their 
President from their own party. The congressional leaders tell me to 
negotiate with President Trump. President Trump tells me to figure it 
out with the congressional leaders. This political catch-22--never seen 
before--has driven our government to dysfunction.
  Americans know why the dysfunction is occurring: a dysfunctional 
President. Hence, we are in a Trump shutdown with party leaders who 
will not act without him. It has created the chaos and the gridlock we 
find ourselves in today. It all really stems from the President, whose 
inability to clinch a deal has created the Trump shutdown.
  I agree with Majority Leader McConnell. The Trump shutdown was 
totally avoidable. President Trump walked away from not one but two 
bipartisan deals, and that is after he walked away from an agreement in 
principle on DACA that we reached way back in the fall of last year. If 
he had been willing to accept any one of these deals, we wouldn't be 
where we are today.
  On Friday, in the Oval Office, I made what I thought was a very 
generous offer to the President--the most generous offer yet. The 
President demanded for months that a deal on DACA include the wall. 
Most Democrats don't think the wall is effective. We think it is 
expensive and a waste of money. We are all for tough border security, 
but every expert will tell you that drones, sensory devices, roads, and 
personnel are far more effective than the wall.
  Because the President campaigned on the wall--even though he said it 
would be paid for by Mexico--and demands the wall, for the sake of 
compromise, for the sake of coming together, I offered it. Despite what 
some people are saying on TV--and mind you, these folks were not in the 
room during the discussion--that is exactly what happened. The 
President picked a number for a wall. I accepted it. It wasn't my 
number. It wasn't the number in the bills here. He picked it. It would 
be hard to imagine a more reasonable compromise. All along, the 
President has been saying: I will do DACA and Dreamers in return for 
the wall. He has it. He can't take yes for an answer. That is why we 
are here.
  We don't have anyone in the White House, in the Senate, or in the 
House, Republicans of the President's own party, to tell him he has to 
straighten this whole thing out. He can't say yes one minute and no the 
next--three, four, five times.
  The bottom line is this: It would be hard to imagine a much more 
reasonable compromise. I was, in principle, agreeing to help the 
President get his signature campaign promise--something Democrats and 
Republicans on the Hill staunchly oppose--in exchange for DACA, a group 
of people the President said he has great love for. I essentially 
agreed to give the President something he has said he wants in exchange 
for something we both want, but only hours after he seemed to be very 
open, very eager about that generous, tentative agreement--and it was 
only tentative; there were no handshakes--he backed away from the last 
best chance to avoid a shutdown.
  That is why, from one corner of America to another, this is being 
called the Trump shutdown. It is trending all over. People from one end 
of the country to the other know it is the Trump shutdown, and they 
know why. They have seen what the President has done. It is a direct 
result of the President, who has been proved unwilling to compromise 
and is, thus, unable to govern.
  The deal wasn't everything the President wanted. It certainly wasn't 
everything we wanted. It was a compromise--something nobody loved, but 
everyone could live with; something good for the country. It would have 
staved off a government shutdown on Friday. It could still reopen the 
government today. I am willing to seal the deal to sit and work right 
now with the President or anyone he designates. Let's get it done.
  Meanwhile, the Republican leader would have you believe we Democrats 
forced the shutdown. He forgets that several Members of his own party 
voted against the CR. Are they holding the government hostage over 
illegal immigration? No, it doesn't seem that way.
  The Republican leader accuses Democrats of holding up pay for our 
troops. I heard Speaker Ryan blame the Senate on TV, but yesterday 
Senator McCaskill offered a motion to make sure our military gets paid, 
and the majority leader himself objected. The

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majority leader prevented the troops from getting paid. This would have 
passed in a minute. Speaker Ryan should talk to Leader McConnell, who 
is the only person in the U.S. Senate standing in the way of paying our 
troops, not anybody here.
  We don't want to use the troops as hostages. Unfortunately, some on 
the other side may be doing just that. We can make sure our troops get 
paid right now if the majority leader would only consent. If there is 
pride of authorship, let him offer the resolution. We will not block 
it. We will applaud it. I hope it can happen as soon as possible.
  The Republican leader also accuses Democrats of blocking CHIP, when 
he full well knows every Democrat here supports extending CHIP. It is 4 
months lapsed. Who let that happen? The Republican majority. A 
Democratic majority would never have allowed CHIP to expire.
  Now, just because it was placed on a CR--that was a bad idea for so 
many reasons--Republicans want to pretend they are advocates of CHIP, 
but quite the contrary. They were using the 10 million kids on CHIP and 
holding them as hostages for the 800,000 kids who are Dreamers. Kids 
against kids; innocent kids against innocent kids. That is no way to 
operate in this country.
  Again, a party that controls the House, the Senate, and the 
Presidency would rather sit back and point fingers of blame than roll 
up their sleeves and govern.
  The way out of this is simple. Our parties are very close on all of 
the issues we have been debating for months now. We are so close. I 
believe, we might have had a deal twice, only for the President to 
change his mind and walk away. The President must take yes for an 
answer. Until he does, it is the Trump shutdown.
  He has said he has a love for Dreamers. Let him show it. He said he 
needs a wall and border security. Accept our offer to do both of those 
things because we Democrats--while we think the wall will not 
accomplish very much and cost a lot of money--we strongly believe in 
border security and fully supported the President's budget proposal on 
border security for this year.
  So this is the Trump shutdown. Only President Trump can end it. We 
Democrats are at the table ready to negotiate. The President needs to 
pull up a chair and end this shutdown.
  I yield the floor.

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