[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 42 (Wednesday, March 5, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1512-S1513]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Federal Budget
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I think everyone so enjoyed listening
to the State of the Union Address last night, and for so many
Tennesseans--we have heard from them today--they were excited, they
felt hopeful, and they also are watching very closely what the actions
of the House and the Senate are going to be.
Now, many of them have mentioned that they know we have that March 14
funding deadline coming up, and so, in 9 days, the Federal Government
would be running out of money. And they have heard my colleagues from
across the aisle talk about shutting the government down and making
that choice to shut the government down because they don't want to pass
a budget.
But if you shut the government down, then you are not going to be
able to move forward on President Trump's agenda. We know they are not
for that agenda, but what they are missing is that the American people
are for President Trump's agenda. They want to see the border secure.
They want inflation to come down. They want crime in the cities to be
dealt with. They want our standing in the world to be returned. They
support President Trump.
And we know that when President Trump was returned to the Oval
Office, he was given a powerful mandate from the American people, and
he deserves to have his agenda shape government spending. But we know
there is little time left, and so we begin to hear those conversations
that we usually hear about having a continuing resolution.
Now, the reason conservatives like me oppose that is because it
continues the current spending, and that is a Joe Biden budget. And we
know that, under the Biden administration, they literally ran the
numbers off the government credit card. They were spending so much
money. They have driven this Nation's debt to $36.5 trillion.
This pandemic and post-pandemic spending has left every single
American spending $1,060 more per month to buy the same basket of goods
and services they were buying in 2021. Now, think about that. That is
the result of Bidenflation: $1,060 more a month to buy the same basket
of goods and services you could buy 4 years ago--because we know what
has happened with Bidenflation. We know the true rate of that inflation
is, cumulatively, over 20 percent.
It is not what they wanted to say--core inflation is only 3 percent
or it is only 4 percent. Anybody that buys milk and eggs knows that is
not right. And, of course, it is going to take a while to get those
numbers down, to look at the prices of gas and groceries and rent and
utilities.
And we know that the Biden budgets are what have fueled this growing
debt, this annual deficit that we have seen, and the fact that now,
when you look at every single American, their portion of our Nation's
debt is now $107,000--$107,000.
I was talking to a friend this week who has a new baby--just arrived,
brandnew--and they are so excited to once again have a little baby in
their family. And as we were talking about politics and all that was
going on and the excitement of the baby, I said: And when you look at
the Federal debt, their share, their ``welcome to the world'' present
from the U.S. Federal Government: You now, as a U.S. citizen, share in
this $36.5 trillion debt to the point of $107,000.
I think the American people know that our fiscal path would lead us
to disaster if we do not change what we are doing, if we do not look at
where we are spending this money.
Thank goodness that President Donald Trump has taken the time to look
seriously at what the Federal Government spends and, yes, to work
toward moving us to a balanced budget.
Now, one of the ways that he is doing this--and, yes, there have been
Executive orders and there has also been the implementation of the
Department of Government Efficiency. We refer to this as DOGE.
Today, some of us have had the opportunity to listen to Elon Musk and
his team who are carrying out the work at the Department of Government
Efficiency.
DOGE, so far, has found $105 billion of inefficiencies in the Federal
Government--$105 billion. They are finding about $4 billion a day. The
President went through a list last night of some of the waste that is
there for projects that maybe really do not yield a result that will
benefit the hard-working taxpayer.
We also heard about fraud and people that are receiving Social
Security checks that maybe don't exist, people that might be 125, 150,
160 years old, even over 300 years old. That is fraud. And we all are
very hopeful that we are going to be able to close that loop, find out
who these individuals are, and make certain that they are prosecuted
and that money is returned to the U.S. taxpayer.
This is a huge step toward getting our fiscal house in order. Yet
these savings that we are finding are only going to be made official
and permanent when we put them into the congressional budget.
Now, we all know that this requires us to go through the rescission
process. This requires us to codify these reductions so that they are
removed from the budget in future years.
We know that that is going to require us to get back to regular order
on the budget as we go through this process, as we work through
reconciliations, making certain there is a clear path to end continuing
resolutions, return to regular order, return to a budget document, and
be able to deliver.
I will tell you this: When I talk to Tennesseans, they want
transparency. I think one of the things they have so appreciated about
DOGE is that they have a website. They are putting all of this
information on the website. They are putting it on their X account, but
they are showing the American people what they are doing, where they
are finding waste, where they are finding fraud, and how they are being
able to address this.
This means that as we work through this, we are going to have to take
our actions. We are going to have to return to that regular order. We
are going to have to bring these spending bills to the floor, and we
are going to have to insist and vote for and support a balanced budget
so that we begin to reduce, first, eliminate our deficit for the year,
and then target balancing our Federal budget and beginning to reduce
our debt.
I am so pleased that President Trump talked about this last night in
his State of the Union Address because it is important not only for
today, tomorrow but for our children and grandchildren's future. He
mentioned this--the sovereignty, the stability of our Nation.
What we want is to make the tough choices today, to make the spending
reductions today, so that in the future, our children have a nation
that is firmly sovereign and is able to stand whatever comes our way.
I think it is so interesting that in 2010, the summer of 2010,
Admiral Mullen was asked the question: What keeps you up at night; what
worries you the most; what is our greatest threat to our Nation's
freedom?
His response was our Nation's debt, and we all know that debt has
doubled since that point in 2010 when he made that comment.
[[Page S1513]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Banks). The Senator from Oklahoma.