[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 16 (Wednesday, January 25, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Page S84]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            SOUTHERN BORDER

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I came to the floor to talk about the 
border one more time, but I was intrigued by the rhetorical questions 
my friend from Illinois has asked the Speaker.
  I have got a question for President Biden: When you say that you are 
not going to negotiate on the debt ceiling, does that mean that the 
Federal Government is going to continue to rack up more and more debt 
on top of the $30 trillion that we already owe, particularly during 
inflationary times when interest rates on that debt basically are 
eating up more and more of our discretionary budget?
  To me, if the answer is yes, I am going to refuse to negotiate as we 
continue to rack up more and more debt, about two-thirds of which is on 
autopilot, as the Presiding Officer knows--it is mandatory spending. 
That is a supremely irresponsible position to take.
  President Biden, when he was in the Senate, was known as a dealmaker, 
and as I said yesterday, during 2011, he negotiated with Senator 
McConnell the Budget Control Act, which was probably the most recent 
response, sort of a mixed bag as it was, to try to control Federal 
spending. It was a noble effort, although it did not succeed.
  So I know our friends on the Democratic side would like to sort of 
add to Mr. McCarthy's challenges. We have got 6 months, perhaps, 
between now and the time the extraordinary measures the Treasury 
Department is going to be using to make sure we don't actually breach 
that debt limit, but I would suggest that the time would be better 
used, rather than sort of to add gasoline to the fire, to actually try 
to solve the problem. And the problem--the debt limit--is real. It 
needs to be addressed by two people: Speaker McCarthy and the President 
of the United States. Because anything the Senate were to pass with 60 
votes, which would be required, would certainly be dead on arrival in 
the House of Representatives.
  And so as a practical matter, while we are going to be very 
interested and engaged in the debate and discussion, that is where the 
decision is going to have to be made sometime between now and the time 
extraordinary measures are exhausted, perhaps as early as June.
  But in the meantime, for the President of the United States, who 
represents not just Democrats, who represents all Americans--all 330 
million-plus of us--to say: I am not negotiating, even though he has 
got a track record as a Senator and as a Vice President of negotiating 
hard things like this, to me, is an irresponsible answer, and I hope he 
will reconsider.

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