[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 2 (Tuesday, January 4, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S14-S15]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          Biden Administration

  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I know that you are probably like me 
and you have been grateful for the time to be home and to see family 
and friends and just to chat with them about what is going on in their 
lives and the issues that are important to them, what they are looking 
at. It has been so interesting to get their perspective as we have 
visited.
  I flipped through the papers yesterday, and I realize that many of 
our friends around town have this renewed sense of optimism about 
President Biden's ability to lead the country. I found that really 
quite interesting. You could look at it and say: It may be a new year, 
but it is the same old Biden.
  It goes without saying that I do not share what I see as a misguided 
view. I entered this year with the same

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healthy skepticism that I had back in December as we were finishing 
that legislative year. I will say this; that for the past year, the 
Democratic majority has indulged an administration that has treated 
their electoral victory like a mandate to enact some of the most 
irresponsible and radical policies we have seen in over a generation.
  Now they are dusting off an agenda that is so unhinged, it has kept 
the Democrats deadlocked against one another for the year. We have seen 
this agenda breed mistrust, tension, and anger between the American 
people and their government. Few, if any, of those people could state 
that they are better off now than they were under President Trump and 
Republican leadership. But still, the Democratic majority has continued 
to push Biden's agenda on behalf of the most radical portions of their 
base.
  Yes, leaning left--they are leaning far left. They are listening to 
the social justice warriors and the climate partisans and the Big 
Government activists, and the Democratic leadership is doing exactly 
what they are telling them they want done. Meanwhile, they are ignoring 
the people back home who actually have to deal with the consequences of 
this political tunnel vision.
  Time after time in poll after poll, even more polls that have come 
out today, the American people have made it abundantly clear that they 
are not just dissatisfied with the President's failure to lead, with 
his radical agenda--you know what, they are not just angry. What I 
learned from Tennesseans is that people are really frightened by what 
they see taking place with this far-left, hard-left turn.
  President Biden has to know all of this. The Democratic leadership 
has to know all of this. Look at all the polls. It doesn't matter if it 
is NPR, it doesn't matter if it is AP, it doesn't matter if it is CNN, 
the agenda, the President, the Vice President--they are all underwater. 
I think they have probably seen this coming since day one of this 
disastrous administration.
  Take some of the specific issues. The Democratic leadership has had a 
front row seat to what is happening on the southern border. So has the 
administration. There has been a complete collapse of our Nation's 
sovereignty at the southern border. With the stroke of a pen, President 
Biden dismantled the policies that were keeping us safe. He invited 
waves of illegal immigrants into the country, said: Y'all come. Y'all 
come. We are ready for you.
  He threw the Border Patrol and local law enforcement under the bus, 
did not listen to them. You don't have to take my word for it. Go to 
the southern border. Go visit with them.
  He has let the cartel step into the leadership void at the southern 
border. The drug dealers and the human traffickers are in control of 
the southern border at this point in time. You do not cross that border 
unless you have paid the cartels. But you know what, admitting this 
does not fit the agenda of the Democratic leadership, so they just 
ignore it. Now, President Biden and my Democratic colleagues continue 
to evade responsibility for keeping the border secure and safeguarding 
the national security. They don't want to talk about that.
  They are also not wanting to talk about the threat posed by the 
Chinese Communist Party and our other adversaries abroad. And that is 
right--the Chinese Communist Party is an adversary. They are not a 
competitor. They are not a friend or a frenemy. They are an adversary. 
What are they doing? They are conducting surveillance, academic 
espionage, and intellectual property theft. They are doing this every 
single day. It is all part of the standing operating procedures of the 
new axis of evil and all being ignored by people who are charged with 
running this country, keeping this country safe.
  Tennesseans will tell you they are very concerned. The American 
people are very concerned. The polls are showing it. And they are 
blaming the Biden administration for not feeling safe, not feeling 
secure, for the supply chain crisis, for inflation. These are all 
things that have been brought about in the past year by decisions this 
administration has made, Executive orders they have executed.
  Every time people in this country pick up their phone, they are faced 
with the knowledge that many of the programs and social media platforms 
that they once enjoyed are controlled by people who refuse to 
prioritize privacy and data security and realize that these cyber 
protections are important.
  They are grateful for all the sunlight that you and I, Mr. President, 
have been able to shine on the problems with Big Tech. So many times as 
I was at home, people would mention to me how much they have learned 
through the hearings that we have held, the roundtable discussions, and 
they are wanting to see more attention brought to keeping us safe and 
limiting the surveillance, the property theft, and the academic 
espionage that the Chinese Communist Party and our adversaries are 
conducting in the virtual space. They are looking forward to seeing us 
translate this bipartisan consensus into action. They are looking 
forward to what we are going to deliver when it comes to online 
privacy, data security, section 230 reforms, to protect our innovators, 
to protect our children online, to protect our consumers.
  When people look at what is being done, like the work we have done on 
technology policy, and what is not being done when it comes to 
addressing China, addressing Russia, dealing with Iran, when it comes 
to dealing with inflation, prices at the pump, and prices that are 
happening at the grocery store, they look at this and they say: Where 
is the President? Where is the Vice President? Where are people who 
should be working for the American people in Congress?
  When we talk about the Democratic leadership, we know that they are 
too busy catering to the most radical fringe of the Democratic Party to 
do their job, and they are too busy with that to govern or to keep the 
economy in one piece and to keep the border intact or to provide for 
the common defense or to exercise a little oversight over some of the 
world's most powerful corporations.
  Well, the American people deserve better. Tennesseans are wanting to 
see action. So while some of our colleagues across the aisle have a 
renewed sense of optimism about President Biden's ability to pull them 
out of this skid on this agenda that is going nowhere, the American 
people have spoken. They do not want what you are offering.
  My resolve is going to be to stand here, to stand between what is 
happening, this destructive, as I call it, ``Build Back Broke'' agenda, 
and to protect Tennesseans and future generations of Americans from 
such an adverse and negative impact.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.