[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 130 (Tuesday, July 29, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4787-S4789]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Trump Administration
Mr. President, on costs, chaos, and corruption, nearly 8 months into
Donald Trump's second term, the American people feel deep buyer's
remorse. As you have seen so many times, Donald Trump's big promises
turned out to be just duds, turned out to be more lies. He seems to lie
every day. He doesn't even care. He doesn't even shrug his shoulders.
He doesn't show a bit of remorse on his face as he spews out lie after
lie after lie.
Today, only 37 percent of people approve of the job Donald Trump is
doing, according to Gallup. Only 37 percent of Americans believe the
country
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is headed in the right direction, according to a recent YouGov poll.
And an overwhelming number of Americans, including Independents and
conservatives, despise Donald Trump's ``Big Ugly Betrayal.''
These are not the signs of a golden age; this is Trump malaise,
created by three things: higher costs, endless chaos, and rampant
corruption.
Let's talk about costs--the No. 1 thing on Americans' minds.
Donald Trump's tariffs have been a national sales tax on the American
people. Yale Budget Lab estimated this week that the totality of Donald
Trump's tariffs will cost $2,400 this year--$2,400. That is a lot of
money.
The cost of healthcare is going to skyrocket. Thanks to the ``Big
Ugly Bill,'' as many as 15 million Americans are going to lose their
coverage. Even if you don't lose your coverage outright, you are still
in great, great danger of paying far more out-of-pocket, hundreds of
dollars more--sometimes even thousands--for healthcare insurance. That
is because Republicans failed to extend the ACA's premium tax credits,
which expire at the end of the year.
Twenty-four million Americans will soon get a letter in the mail
telling them that their premiums are going to go up in 2026. This
letter ain't coming 2 years from now, as they tried--the Republicans--
to kick the can down the road and hide this from people; it is coming
right now, folks. You are going to get those letters, those increases,
in the mail. Remember, it is because of Donald Trump and the Republican
Senators' lack of courage to stand up for you as they bow down to
millionaires.
If Republicans don't work with Democrats to restore these tax
credits, premiums are going to go up by 75 percent, and 5 million
Americans will lose their coverage altogether.
Let me say that again. If Republicans don't work with Democrats to
restore these tax credits, premiums are set to go up by 75 percent, and
5 million Americans will lose coverage altogether. That is precisely
what Donald Trump did to help the billionaire class and the corporate
special interests--hurting, and hurting grievously, American families,
so many of them.
(Mr. SHEEHY assumed the Chair.)
Mr. President, on chaos--now, as costs go up for the American people,
so does the chaos. It is unending. It is exhausting. It is dangerous.
Donald Trump's trade war: total chaos. One minute he says yes to
tariffs, the next he says no, and after that, he changes his mind
again. And the American people are going to pay a lot more because of
these tariffs.
What about DOGE? Again, unmitigated chaos and a failure at achieving
any real efficiency. DOGE has fired, rehired, and fired again everyone
from VA workers to medical researchers to USAID workers to even nuclear
safety personnel. Incredible.
The Social Security Administration is being hollowed out in realtime.
They don't like Social Security, these rightwing DOGE people--it is a
government program--even though it is the most successful government
program we have ever had.
So they are afraid to just shoot it through the heart. So instead,
they strangle it: fewer people answering the phones, fewer people
solving the problems when you can't get your check, putting barriers in
the way of people applying. They have sent 7,000 staffers packing. Wait
times on the phones have gone way up. Online services have gone dark.
Millions of seniors who depend on Social Security have been left
anxious and betrayed and in the dark.
You can be sure when that chaos occurs, they will somehow figure out
a way to blame someone else. But they are to blame. They did it.
Finally, as this all happens, as Americans pay out of pocket, as
chaos keeps Americans distracted day after day after day, what is
happening here in Washington with all this cost increase happening,
with all this chaos? In addition, unfortunately, it is unprecedented
corruption. Never in our lifetimes have we seen a President use the
levers of power so transparently to personally enrich himself and his
inner circle.
That never happened in America. Presidents, Democrats, Republicans,
Independents, conservatives, liberals--they respected the fact that
being in high office was a guardianship, not to grab and reach and make
money and enrich themselves. But that is what Trump is doing regularly.
In the past few months, Donald Trump accepted a luxury plane from
Qatar to use as Air Force One. And we have no clue--no clue--as to how
many hundreds of millions or more in taxpayer dollars will be spent in
renovations. You have to renovate it because there could be listening
devices in even the little nails and screws in those planes. So you
have to almost take it apart and put it back together so Donald Trump
can have his plane.
The way the deal works, after he leaves office, it goes to his
Presidential library. Can you imagine a gift like that to a sitting
President from a country we have to deal with, in Qatar, where we have
had good and bad relations all the time?
That is not all. He turned the south lawn of the White House into a
Tesla dealership when he was friendly with Musk. His family is getting
rich off crypto schemes, selling access to the White House for profit--
personal profit.
Truly, the Trump administration is rampant self-dealing at an
unprecedented scale, and that turns the stomachs of Americans who
believe we are better than that. And there are many millions of us who
believe that we are better than what Donald Trump is doing.
And then, we have Jeffrey Epstein. The more time passes, the less we
all know about the truth behind Trump's relationship with the late
billionaire predator. Donald Trump promised he would release the
Epstein files. While he was on the campaign trail, he made that
promise. He has yet to do it. Speaker Johnson quite literally preferred
to shut Congress down and send everyone home on an ``Epstein recess''
rather than risking a vote on the Epstein files to take place.
Americans are right to be angry over the lack of transparency. But
this isn't just about getting the truth; this is also every bit about
our national security. Whatever may be in the Epstein files is clearly
troubling enough that Donald Trump doesn't want to touch this issue
with a 10-foot pole. So it is natural to ask: What happens if America's
adversaries use cyber attacks or other means to access investigative
material into Jeffrey Epstein that are embarrassing--or worse--for the
President and/or the people around him? What happens if Epstein
materials end up in the hands of the Chinese Government or Russia or
North Korea?
Unless the Epstein files are released and made fully transparent to
the public, could our adversaries use that information to blackmail
someone like the President or other senior leaders in government? What
kind of risk could that pose to our national security?
So, today, I am calling on the FBI to immediately conduct a
counterintelligence threat assessment to ensure we understand the risk
posed if a foreign adversary were to gain access to anything connected
to the Epstein files. Specifically, I am calling on the FBI to do three
things: First, we must determine if foreign intelligence agencies could
gain access to the information the President does not want to release
in the Epstein files through methods that include cyber intrusion;
second, the FBI must identify any vulnerabilities that could be
exploited by foreign intelligence agencies with access to nonpublic
information in the Epstein files, including being able to gain leverage
over Donald Trump, his family, or other senior government officials;
and, third, I am calling on the FBI to publicly show their developing
mitigation strategies to counter these threats and safeguard our
national security.
The idea of foreign adversaries hacking into Agency files to collect
information that could be leveraged against our government is not at
all a remote possibility. Just last Thursday, it was reported that DHS
and HHS were among several government Agencies hacked as a part of a
breach to Microsoft's SharePoint service. This hack, Microsoft
confirmed, was carried out by Chinese actors.
Hacks like this could very well be an attempt to exploit Federal
systems to get access to Epstein files and potentially use it to
influence those named in the files.
Whatever is in the Epstein files is concerning enough that Donald
Trump is running scared. If that is, in fact, the case, our adversaries
could certainly be
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interested in trying to use this information to hurt America and
Americans. We must ensure that that can never happen, and the FBI must
immediately conduct a risk assessment so we are not caught flatfooted
if our adversaries have already seen these files.
National security, Mr. President, is not and should never be a
partisan issue. We need to do everything we can to make sure we are
protecting the United States and American families every single day.
This report is imperative to do just that.
And there is one more thing Donald Trump could do to quell people's
anger, confusion, frustration, and fears over the national security
ramifications: Stop running away from this issue; tell the truth; and
if there is clearly no national security risk, release the Epstein
files, President Trump.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic whip.