[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 20 (Thursday, January 30, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S509-S512]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Trump Executive Orders
Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, over the last few days, the American
people have felt the painful consequences of Trump's disastrous funding
freeze.
Seniors who count on Meals on Wheels have wondered whether they would
have dinner this week. Head Start teachers in red States and blue
States have panicked over whether they would have the funds needed to
keep their doors open and take care of kids. Disaster relief for people
who have endured the unimaginable and have been knocked off their feet
was thrown into jeopardy. Grant programs to help firefighters do their
jobs, to combat the fentanyl crisis, to get families healthcare--and so
much more--have been, in an instant, at risk of evaporating into thin
air.
I heard from a Tribe in my State concerned they would have to lay off
hundreds of staff providing essential services for the Tribe. That
could mean putting everything from providing healthcare to housing in
jeopardy because of the President's freeze.
A shelter for homeless youth in my State still--still--can't access
its HUD funding and is staring down a $3 million deficit, forcing them
to hold an emergency board meeting to figure out what, if anything,
they can now do.
Hospitals in my State are worried that programs which are
appropriately focused on someone's gender or race are in jeopardy, like
how pulse oximeters don't work as well as on dark skin, so they need
other pathways to be found.
The chaos and the confusion, the needless stress and distraction are
the result of having a President who is more focused on the
billionaires who now fill his administration than on the plight of
regular people all over this country. But yesterday, because the
American people spoke up loud and clear, Donald Trump retreated from
his devastating blanket funding freeze.
However, make no mistake, there is still far too much chaos on the
ground, and Trump is still blocking billions of dollars for communities
across the country--in every one of our States--through these Executive
orders. We are talking about critical funding to rebuild our roads and
bridges, resources that are already creating thousands of good-paying,
new clean energy jobs in every State of this country, and critical
global investments that help keep America safe.
This is so completely unacceptable. So, today, I am calling on
President Trump to take four simple, commonsense steps.
First of all, he needs to ensure that every last dollar--down to the
last penny--that was caught up in this disastrous blanket funding
freeze gets out the door.
Secondly, he needs to rescind his Executive orders that are still, at
this very moment, ripping funding away from American families and
communities.
Third, he needs to withdraw Russell Vought's nomination to oversee
our Nation's budget. It is clear that the person who masterminded so
much of this chaos doesn't belong anywhere near the Office of
Management and Budget.
Finally, President Trump needs to abandon, once and for all, his
illegal scheme to skirt around our laws and block funding that American
workers and families are counting on.
I am not asking for a lot here: Ensure every dollar held up by this
illegal freeze is restored; stop the ongoing effort to block funding;
withdraw the mastermind of this chaos; and simply follow the law.
The American people deserve better than the catastrophe we have
witnessed this week. They deserve to know that the investments Trump is
currently holding up--to rebuild the highway they drive to work on or
to lower their energy costs or so much more--will make it out the door.
If the President is so intent on opposing funding for infrastructure
projects and good-paying American jobs, he needs to sit down at the
negotiating table and make his case to Congress. I will not let the
President rip up the Constitution or rip money away from our
communities.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, I rise today to speak out on behalf of the
American people about the Trump administration's unjust and
unconstitutional cutoff of Federal grants and assistance programs.
Donald Trump's administration isn't governing. It is not delivering
for the American people. It is stealing from our public services, from
Meals on Wheels to community health centers, to housing for our
veterans.
From day one, Donald Trump's administration has careened from chaos
to self-induced crises. American families and workers are left guessing
whether lifesaving services, school lunches, help paying for home
heating, basic healthcare, and public safety are going to be funded day
by day.
The collective outrage of literally everyone in this country, along
with lawsuits filed over its illegal behavior, got Donald Trump's
administration to rescind its latest memo to cut off Federal money. But
the chaos continues. The confusion continues. The Federal funding witch
hunt continues.
The Trump administration has made clear they intend to proceed with
their cruel plan of stalling or stopping essential Federal funding.
They will lie, disregard Congress, and now they are bypassing the
courts.
We will need all of our collective engagement to make sure that
Donald
[[Page S510]]
Trump, Elon Musk, and their unelected, unqualified henchmen keep our
services going and stop breaking the law because the American people
are paying the price on a daily basis.
The consequences--the consequences--of Trump's Federal funding cutoff
are already far-reaching, and they are devastating. Doctors were told
to turn away patients when the Medicaid payment portals were down. The
organizations that are the backbone of our country--food pantries,
vocational services--are looking at laying people off. Veterans might
be getting evicted as their rent payments don't come through. There
might not be someone on the other end of the phone at the national
suicide hotline. Think about what that might mean to someone in crisis.
I say again, this funding was sent by Congress to provide necessary
services to our constituents in all States, red and blue alike. It is
essential, and it has already been signed into law--passed by the U.S.
House, passed on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and signed by a
President.
This is what the American Revolution was all about. When the redcoats
were coming down Massachusetts Avenue, heading toward Lexington and
Concord in Massachusetts in 1775, the Minutemen and -women were coming
out, and they were all saying the same thing: no taxation without
representation.
The King would not give the American Colonies any members of
Parliament. They kept begging for the ability to have representation.
So after the American Revolution, and they wrote the Constitution,
the first article is to create a House and Senate and to give that
first article the power of the purse, the power to spend money. They
made it very clear. That is what the Revolution was about.
So I say again, this funding was sent by Congress--article I--to
provide necessary services to our constituents in all States. If the
Trump administration claims this funding ``does not improve the day-to-
day lives of those we serve,'' then there is just one question every
American should be asking the President: Who do you serve? Because it
certainly isn't the everyday Americans who will wake up tomorrow
without heat in their house, their medicine, or a roof over their head.
The Trump administration said it is targeting ``Green New Deal social
engineering.'' When Trump says he wants to end the Green New Deal, he
wants to end union battery manufacturing jobs in Ohio; he wants to end
rebates that help American families afford new air-conditioners and
heaters; he wants to keep school districts from getting clean buses to
take kids to school; he wants to end programs that help our communities
rebuild after a disaster, such as the fires in Los Angeles or the
hurricanes that devastated Georgia and North Carolina.
What Trump is doing with this so-called freeze, with his Executive
orders, with his firing of inspectors general and government
regulators, is an unconstitutional, illegal power grab.
But here is the truth: Trump can't get rid of the Green New Deal
because there is no stopping a mobilization and a movement once it is
galvanized. The Green New Deal doesn't stop until the climate crisis
stops. The Green New Deal doesn't stop until fossil fuel billionaires
stop lining their pockets while our cities burn to the ground.
I introduced the Green New Deal resolution nearly 6 years ago with
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Its values and jobs and justice
and climate action are now core parts of our economy and our society.
Clearly Trump's unelected bureaucrats are terrified of the power of
union jobs, clean air and clean water, and climate action. They are
trying to break our country's laws in order to break our movement. We
cannot let them do that.
We know we face an uphill battle with a climate denier-in-chief. He
doesn't have a Cabinet that he has appointed; he has a cartel that he
is putting in place.
You know the saying ``money talks''? Well, we heard the money talk
loud and clear with Donald Trump's day-one Executive actions, which
were a parade of price-gouging fossil fuel giveaways. His energy agenda
isn't American dominance; it is the dominance of his donors over our
energy policy. It is not ``all of the above''; it is ``oil above all.''
Yes, drill, baby, drill, but kill solar. Kill wind. Kill all-electric
vehicles. Kill the Green Revolution. Kill it. It is not ``all of the
above''; it is taking care of all of his fossil fuel donor buddies.
He made a promise that if he won, he would kill the competition; he
would kill the Darwinian paranoia-inducing competition that is
happening with wind and solar and all-electric vehicles and battery
storage technologies and any technologies that reduce greenhouse gases,
which are dangerously warming our planet. And why are they doing that?
Because Big Oil and Big Gas are running scared. Fossil fuels have been
getting outcompeted by wind and solar and all-electric vehicles. The
Big Oil and Big Gas barons see people rejecting their products and
having an alternative, and they want to choke out the competition.
That is what the fossil fuel fat cats demanded when they got Donald
Trump elected, and that is what Trump is delivering on with his orders
to attack climate action, attack offshore wind, attack international
climate agreements, and attack our movement, the Green New Deal
movement of young people across our country demanding that this
government do something about the threat of climate change that was
ignored for generations. That is what young people are saying all
across our country: Protect us. Protect us from the threat of climate
change.
Instead, what Donald Trump is trying to do is to kill all of the
protections. All of them. All of them.
So just think of what has been happening. As the rest of the country
is sitting around the kitchen table debating necessities to sacrifice
this month, they are wondering if they can rebuild after a wildfire or
if they can keep the lights on when prices spike as energy gets
exported overseas.
I want everyone to understand this: He wants to export oil and export
natural gas out of our country. That is his promise to the oil and gas
barons. Do you know what that does domestically? It increases the price
for everyone here. Consumers and businesses have to pay more because
there is less oil and gas here--inflation. Yes, that is the plan--
increase the profit for the big fossil fuel plants.
So we can't allow Trump and Republicans to throw families into
financial instability just to pay for tax breaks for the ultrawealthy.
Just like climate change won't be solved by any one President,
climate action won't be stopped by any one President.
Look at what has happened in the past week. This isn't business as
usual, and we have to stop acting like it. That is why I won't be
supporting any Trump nominee who will only do his illegal bidding.
I urge all of my colleagues to join me in rejecting those who will
reject the will of Congress and reject the needs of the American
people.
From day one, Donald Trump has been singularly committed to
abandoning working people, their future, our very democracy--all for
the power of wealth. That is absolutely unacceptable.
Donald Trump isn't just ignoring the promise to lower costs for
families and make our Nation safer; he is inflicting harm on millions
of Americans, taking away funding for critical, lifesaving health
research, from cancer to Alzheimer's. The potential ramifications of
Trump's Federal funding freeze are endless.
Trump is trying to bully the American people and public servants into
submission by ignoring the law and cutting off funding to take away the
services the public needs to get by. This is what dictators do. He
wants us to forget what he stands for, for us to either give up either
slowly or all at once. We cannot do that. We must stand up.
So whether it is racial justice, the rule of law, reproductive
freedom, economic equality, immigrant and refugee rights, our LGBTQ
community, universal healthcare, consumer protections, protecting clean
air and water, creating union jobs and supporting our union workers,
fighting the climate crisis, holding the fat cats accountable for their
greed and corruption, more than ever, we must be the fearless voice for
a livable future. That is my pledge to you.
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It is time to be brave. It is time to stand up for the protection of
the most vulnerable in our country and our vulnerable planet.
He is trying to frighten people. He is trying to scare people. That
is what his agenda has been right from the beginning. And even when his
henchmen put out that first statement in terms of the freeze, the
cutoff of funding on Monday night, what does he attribute it to? They
want to root out Marxism in our country, they want to protect against
transgender people, and they want to kill the Green New Deal. That is
what he puts out on the first night.
Well, just so everyone understands, when Republicans are talking
about Marxism, they are talking about Social Security; they are talking
about Medicare; they are talking about Medicaid; they are talking about
public education. That is what they call Marxism, just so everyone
understands.
They are going to need hundreds of billions of dollars and more in
order to have tax rates for the billionaire boys' club that was sitting
right behind the President at the swearing-in. He promised them tax
breaks. Where is the money going to come from? I will tell you where it
is going to come from--from the programs that they call the Marxist
programs. Those are all the healthcare programs. Those are all the
education programs.
He has nominated a Secretary of Education who has had to promise to
try to end the Department of Education in our country--end it. They
need money for billionaires.
In the Department of Education, title I--that is for the poor
children in America to get an education, money in there for the kids
with disabilities. End the Department of Education? Yes. Marxist. Get
that money into the hands of billionaires and millionaires.
Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, Medicare--those three programs
provide healthcare for 170 million Americans to get the healthcare,
which they need--170 million Americans. That is where the money is--
healthcare. You have to call it Marxist. You have to try to demonize
it. That is because they have to pay back all of those people who gave
them money in order to win in November.
And he then moves on to transgender kids, trying to demonize them.
And we know why he does that. He is just trying to scare people. It is
part of who he is.
And then the third part of what he mentioned on Monday night was the
Green New Deal. The Green New Deal is the ultimate payback because the
President met with the oil and gas executives in April of 2024, and he
said to them: If you give me $1 billion, I will kill all of the
renewable energy projects in America. I will take all the money away.
They gave him the money, and now they are going to get paid back. So
when they say Green New Deal and they want to kill it, just understand
they want to kill all the competition to the oil and gas industry.
The natural gas industry wants all of offshore wind all along the
east coast to just be destroyed because those 30,000 new megawatts
would make obsolete the need for more natural gas pipelines to be built
along the east coast, and he wants to take care of the natural gas
boys. That is what it is all about.
When he says he is going to roll back electric vehicles, roll back
fuel economy standards for the vehicles we drive, he is doing that for
the oil industry. We put 70 percent of the oil which we consume in our
country into gasoline tanks. The more people who drive electric
vehicles, the higher the fuel economy standards, the less oil people
have to consume, the less money in the pockets of the oil barons--but
more money in the pockets of consumers.
So that is what this fight is all about. It is pretty simple. And I
am glad they put it up there on Monday night, what this battle is
about, because I know it is going to create a movement across this
country in the same way that the Green New Deal created a movement that
created the momentum that made it possible for us to pass the IRA in
2022.
But another way of saying IRA is ``the largest climate bill in the
history of the world.'' That is what is scaring--totally scaring--the
oil and gas industry, because they can see they are losing in the
marketplace. They can see that that is where Americans are moving.
So I will just conclude with this one brief history lesson. Back in
2009, when Joe Biden was sworn in as Vice President, we had 2,000,
total, electric vehicles in the United States. That is all. We had
2,000 total megawatts of solar in the United States.
Do you know what is frightening to the oil and gas industry? Last
year, 40,000 new megawatts of solar in 1 year--frightening to them.
All-electric vehicle revolution? Millions have been purchased just in
the last 2 years. The oil industry is petrified because we have gone
from 2,000 megawatts of solar, total, in the whole history of our
country, and 2,000 all-electric vehicles to a revolution, and they want
to stop this revolution.
That is what Trump is all about: the payback to big industries that
want to thwart Americans who are playing a role in being the leader in
the world on all of these green energy and climate issues and then
saying to the rest of the world: We will partner with you to solve this
problem.
But you cannot preach temperance from a barstool. You cannot tell the
rest of the world to stop if you are not doing it yourself. You lose
all credibility, which is why Trump just pulled totally out of the
Paris climate agreement at the same time. He doesn't want to be part of
the world. But that is not how greenhouse gases travel. They travel
with the clouds. They travel all over the world. And unless we lead, we
are going to pay a tremendous price in subsequent generations for what
Donald Trump is trying to perpetrate on our country.
I yield the floor, and I thank the Presiding Officer for his
indulgence, and I thank the Senator from Delaware for his indulgence as
well.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I rise today to address the chaos that has
been caused by this week's disastrous, unprecedented, and
unconstitutional funding freeze directive.
Then-Candidate Trump said on the first night of the Republican
National Convention: Starting on day one, we will drive down prices and
make America affordable again.
I don't think the actions of this week have contributed to making
America affordable again or driving down prices at all. Instead, when
the White House abruptly announced a complete halt to all domestic
grants--grants that covered trillions of dollars of spending to
thousands of organizations, from medical research to police and fire,
from construction projects to daycares and senior centers--it caused
great chaos and concern. I got calls, texts, and emails from hundreds
of Delawareans--from the State and local governments, from nonprofits,
from business leaders--saying: What does this mean?
Meals on Wheels, school lunches for Delawareans in schools, opioid
prevention programs and community healthcare centers, critical programs
for military families stationed at Dover Air Force Base, and police and
fire departments up and down the State raised their hands, digitally,
to say: What does this mean, and where are we going?
The Delaware delegation convened a conference call that day with 250
different participants to try and give them clarity on the path
forward. I hope that this disastrous directive has been rescinded, but
I only can say ``I hope'' because I don't truly know.
The White House Press Office tried to rescind the rescission. So it
is unclear exactly what its status is now. There have been filings in
court, both in the District Court for DC and for Rhode Island. There is
an injunction against the OMB order here in DC. There is an injunction
or a TRO under consideration up in Rhode Island. But it created a mess.
It created a mess at a time when Americans need clarity.
What I have heard from business and business leaders for decades is
that predictability is the most important part for businesses to grow,
and what I have heard from families and friends at home was that this
was not the sort of start they had expected to the Trump
administration.
I want to caution folks: We may not know when or if the
administration will try this order a second time or a third time. I
will remind you that at the beginning of the last Trump administration,
he tried to pass a Muslim
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travel ban--a ban on people coming to this country from a series of
Muslim-majority countries. That ban was enjoined in Federal court. It
was blocked. They tried again. It was blocked. They tried a third time.
It was ultimately found to clear judicial muster.
So, frankly, an administration that has said over and over again they
believe that impoundment is within the scope of power of the President
is likely to try again and again. Impoundment sounds like a fancy way
of putting your dog on a leash in the backyard. What it means is
violating our constitutional order.
Article I of the Constitution sets the powers of Congress, and the
power of the purse--the ability to say what will and won't be spent--is
central to the relevance and the authority of the U.S. Congress.
And I will say there is a reason this is dangerous; this is bad. I am
an appropriator. Those of us who serve on the Appropriations Committee,
every year, participate in a difficult and complex process where we
pull together all the different requirements and requests and issues
and concerns from across our States and departments, and we pass a bill
here on the floor. We pass it through the House. We send it to the
President. The President signs it, and then the directives go out for
what grants and what funding will be available.
I understand; President Trump won the election. There is a new
majority in Congress. I fully expected that this year's appropriations
process would reflect those different priorities. That is the normal
order of things. But this order is reaching back to last year's
appropriations and the previous President and trying to freeze it and
reallocate.
That has real consequences for our ability to come to bipartisan
agreements and pass legislation on appropriations if, in the going-
forward years, Presidents can say, ``I am not actually going to do
disaster relief for this State because I don't like them,'' or, ``I am
going to freeze and cut funding for this program because it doesn't fit
with my priorities,'' when he has already got signed legal orders.
There are still impacts on the ground. I am still hearing from
Delawareans that funding for construction of roads or bridges under the
bipartisan infrastructure law and new energy sources and tax credits
under the Inflation Reduction Act are frozen or facing freezes.
And I want to turn to another concern of mine that is critical,
important, and ongoing, but let's just focus on this first point. Until
Trump backs down on these illegal orders and respects Congress's power
of the purse and puts his focus back on helping Americans and reducing
costs, this place and our country will not function and will not get
better. Nothing about this order makes us safer, more prosperous, or
more secure.
Mr. President, I am speaking today in strong opposition to President
Trump's illegal Executive order of last Friday night that pauses all of
our foreign assistance and development assistance. Let's be clear. Our
development assistance, our foreign aid, isn't about charity; it is
about security, and it is about values. We have alliances and
partnerships around the world that are undergirded by our soft power,
by our partnerships and investments in helping make the world safer,
more stable, and more secure.
And what happened last Friday night at the end of the workday, when
there was no one there to answer urgent questions, was a freeze on all
foreign assistance, with a very narrow exception for food aid, and it
has caused chaos in the global community that delivers aid and
assistance around the world. For days, there were questions
unanswered--what did this mean?--in Ukraine, in Lebanon, where there
are wars and ceasefires, where critical grant funding and work by
contractors help put the lights back on after Russian attacks on the
electrical infrastructure in Ukraine, where a cease-fire implementation
in Lebanon was ongoing; in parts of the world where we were continuing
to bring home to the United States those who had served alongside us in
Afghanistan, Afghan SIVs and their families, waiting for processing,
abandoned from Qatar and here in the United States; a halt on drug
supplies that help keep 20 million people living with HIV through the
program PEPFAR, long supported by Presidents and Congresses of both
parties; a freeze on activity to counter fentanyl and narcotics
trafficking, to push back on Chinese and Russian disinformation, and to
promote democracy. With urgent upcoming elections, the International
Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute are frozen
in their activities and forced to lay off or furlough their workforce.
Let me thank Secretary Rubio for responding to urgent calls to
broaden the aperture for humanitarian waivers for this freeze, but let
me also say that with dozens and dozens of the most senior people at
USAID put on furlough--so implementing this got harder--and with
thousands of contractors who work for USAID in countries around the
world dismissed or laid off, the consequences will be severe.
I will just give you one example. I suspect everyone listening has
heard of the disease Ebola. I suspect not everyone has heard of the
disease Marburg. They are related. They are highly transmissive and
deadly viruses. There is a new outbreak of Ebola in the capital of
Uganda. There is an ongoing outbreak of Marburg in the neighboring
country of Tanzania. This freeze pauses the pandemic surveillance work,
the urgent public health work, the assistance we provide that makes
sure that we are safe from a rapidly emerging and lethal global
pandemic that we put in place after the last pandemic.
When we halt foreign assistance, it has consequences. It is just 1
percent of our total budget. Most Americans think it is a big percent
of our spending, but it is 1 percent--actually, less than 1 percent--of
the total Federal budget. And there is a winner here. It is not the
American taxpayer. Freezing programs like this causes chaos and often
causes more to restart them after a review.
The winner is China. Our biggest global competitor and adversary is
delighted that we have handed them an opportunity to say to communities
and countries around the world that we are not a reliable partner; that
despite contracts and promises, commitments and programs, they now have
months to crow about how we have abandoned our partnerships with
country after country around the world. China is delighted when we lay
off or furlough or cut the resources that help fuel the work of our
diplomats and our development professionals.
And China has seen its opportunity to expand its influence through
programs like the Belt and Road Initiative. They have spent a trillion
dollars in projects across the global south in the last decade, and our
ability to counter Chinese influence, to make strategic investments,
has been put gravely at risk by putting on hold the workforce and the
contracts that help deliver.
The administration may be claiming that this pause is temporary, but
its effects will not be. The lasting impacts on small businesses, on
contractors, on NGOs, and loss of expertise, loss of their workforce,
and loss of their credibility I think will be lasting, dangerous, and
harmful.