[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 151 (Tuesday, September 16, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6631-S6635]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR CONGRESSIONAL DISAPPROVAL UNDER CHAPTER 8 OF TITLE 5,
UNITED STATES CODE, OF THE RULE SUBMITTED BY THE ENVIRONMENTAL
PROTECTION AGENCY RELATING TO ``EMISSIONS BUDGET AND ALLOWANCE
ALLOCATIONS FOR INDIANA UNDER THE REVISED CROSS-STATE AIR POLLUTION
RULE UPDATE''--Motion to Proceed
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I am here, I guess, to offer a
eulogy for the supposed Republican principle that government should not
be used to pick winners and losers. It turns out that principle is
soluble in money.
Months before the 2024 election, President Trump offered big oil and
coal cronies a super deal: They give him $1 billion to take the White
House, of which he got at least several hundred million, and he would
pay them back bigly; he would use government to make them winners and
clean energy losers. So he has bent over backwards to make Big Oil, big
polluters happy.
His efforts to prop up his coal industry donors have been
particularly flagrant. Coal as an energy source is a dirty and dying
industry. Coal is expensive to mine, coal-fired powerplants are
expensive to operate, and coal-powered electricity is expensive to buy.
So besides being toxic to mine and burn, coal is a bad financial play--
at least in the real, open market that Republicans claim to want to
honor.
So to pick his winners and punish his losers, Trump issued a series
of Executive orders directing State and Federal actors to revive the
zombie coal industry.
At the beginning of this year, several Indiana utilities had
announced plans to retire polluting coal plants and shift to cleaner
energy sources. Following Trump's Executive orders and who knows what
other private conversations, several of these utilities canceled plans
to retire the polluting coal units.
This is a pretty big deal well outside of Indiana because coal plants
like these emit hundreds of thousands of tons of pollution each year,
including the pollution which forms smog. Exposure to smog is serious.
It causes lung disease, it causes cardiovascular problems, and it even
causes reproductive issues. It has been documented to cause premature
deaths. And it blows into other States. Prevailing winds take the
pollution and blow it into other States. In fact, I have argued that
there are smokestacks designed specifically to get the pollution out of
the home State and land it on the downwind States, like Rhode Island.
Under the cross-State air pollution rule, EPA sets emissions
``budgets'' to protect people in the downwind States from dangerous,
smog-forming pollution that comes out of another State and blows across
the border from the upwind, coal-fired powerplants. Well, after these
Indiana coal plants got their inducement to extend, EPA had to loosen
its previously-set emissions budget for Indiana that protected the
downwind States in order to allow more smog to spread, because that is
what reopening these plants does--it allows more smog to spread.
EPA promulgated this deregulatory rulemaking without a notice and
comment process, giving no opportunity to anyone downwind--vulnerable
to smog pollution from Indiana--to communicate into the EPA process
their concerns.
Well, back in 1996, Congress enacted the Congressional Review Act to
give Congress the opportunity to vote on regulations like this. During
the Biden administration, the Senate actually conducted 35 rollcall
votes in relation to Republican-sponsored Congressional Review Act
resolutions of disapproval.
[[Page S6632]]
Now the Trump administration is engaged in an effort, at breakneck
speed, to pick winners and punish losers, and if doing so requires them
to tear down protections of Americans' health, of our safety, of the
environment, that is all fine with them.
Congressional Review Act resolutions like this one can help hold the
administration to account. I strongly urge a vote upholding our
response against this polluting regulation.
I move to proceed to Calendar No. 142, S.J. Res. 60.
Mr. YOUNG. Madam President--
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. If the Senator wishes to speak, I am willing to
withdraw my motion to proceed, which actually is not debatable and
would cut him off. But I would like to know how much time the Senator
would like, and then I would like unanimous consent that we then
proceed to the conclusion of Calendar No. 142--and Senator Capito as
well.
Mr. YOUNG. I thank the good Senator.
Madam President, I request 5 minutes to state my case.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. The distinguished chairman of Environment and Public
Works would like some time as well?
Mrs. CAPITO. Five minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. YOUNG. Madam President, I would say that I love all of our
States, and I am very proud that the State of Indiana plays such a
critical role in ensuring economic resiliency and the manufacturing
potential of this great Nation--something so important to all of our
citizens irrespective of where you live.
I represent the most manufacturing-intensive State in the country.
Energy demand is up, manufacturers are invested in expanding, small
businesses are plugging in, and our Nation's energy needs are rising.
Indiana is foremost a manufacturing State. About 45 percent of our
instate electricity generation comes from coal. That is the reality.
That means dependable, around-the-clock capacity isn't optional; it is
how the Hoosier economy runs.
Yes, the expectation was that four Indiana coal-fired power units
would be offline by 2024, but the facts on the ground have changed, and
our responsibility here today is to keep power dependable and
affordable with the megawatts we have--the megawatts we already have.
So what the EPA is doing now is a commonsense correction. That is all
we are talking about--updating Indiana's summer emissions limit to
match the plants that are actually in operation while keeping the
underlying clean air guardrails in place. Keep those in place. Plants
still have to meet current environmental standards. They still have to
run controls. No one is getting a free pass here. This is merely a
housekeeping correction that lines up the State limit with active
generation so unrealistic, retroactive costs aren't forced on
powerplants and ultimately the ratepayer.
This is common sense, pushing aside the bureaucracy and using the
flexibility that we have in the law. It keeps the numbers honest, it
keeps the planning stable for the hottest months of the year, and it
avoids regulatory whiplash. Imagine if we are changing the rules
nonstop in DC. It would create great uncertainty. So this accommodates
the realities on the ground.
If this fix were overturned, Indiana would revert to older limits
designed for a fleet that no longer exists, so, in practice, that means
less operating room during heat waves and higher costs right when our
citizens need power the most--all of our citizens.
Hoosiers are already feeling it. According to the U.S. Energy
Information Administration, Indiana's average home electricity prices
are up roughly 11.5 percent year over year, and the Trump
administration aims to do something about it.
Rather than working to keep generation steady and reliability
predictable, my colleagues--at least some of them--on the other side of
the aisle are advancing a repeal effort that would punish Indiana at
the worst possible time.
Hoosiers should not pay more because government insists on regulating
yesterday's grid instead of today's realities. Instead, we should focus
on adding new capacity--new capacity--before prematurely retiring
existing assets and cut redtape so that generation, pipelines, and
transmission get built faster. That is what we should do. Let's not
write off active megawatts and then act surprised when bills rise and
lights flicker.
So if your priority is reliability and protecting American families
from price spikes, the choice is clear: Keep what works today so we can
build what we need for tomorrow.
I urge my colleagues to vote no on this disapproval resolution.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
Mrs. CAPITO. Madam President, I would like to thank the gentleman
from Indiana for really framing the debate for his home State of
Indiana.
I rise today in opposition as well to S.J. Res. 60, a CRA that is
introduced by my colleague from Rhode Island Senator Whitehouse to
overturn this technical correction to the State of Indiana's emissions.
The interim technical correction is necessary due to the Supreme
Court's stay of the good neighbor rule.
I urge my colleagues to vote no and return the Senate floor to our
business of confirming President Trump's nominees in the face of
historic obstruction.
Allow me to explain just a little bit--and both of them have
explained this. In 2021, the EPA issued a Federal implementation plan
covering Indiana. In doing so, they relied on the announced retirement
of four electric-generating units projected to happen in 2023. In 2022,
those powerplants announced they would no longer close, which EPA
counted for in their good neighbor rule, so the Supreme Court
subsequently stayed that rule, meaning that Indiana was forced into
their now-outdated 2021 emissions budget.
The Trump administration's EPA finalized this interim rule that this
CRA would repeal to adjust Indiana's emissions budget to reflect what
it would have looked like in 2021 had those plants not announced
retirement.
I will say that every single day, every one of our offices is deluged
with people coming in, saying: We need more power in this country. If
we are going to win the race in AI, if we are going to win the next
race in innovation, we have to have more power.
So this is an example, I think, of the Trump EPA working to make
changes that ensure legal durability and reflect practical energy and
environmental needs for specific States that the Biden administration
had neglected.
It is surprising to me that anybody would want to spend time on this
minor interim rule specific to one State that will not have a material
impact on air quality or attainment of the 2008 ozone standard, which
is the purpose of the rule. However, as we have seen time and time
again, they are relentless in their efforts to weaponize our
environmental statutes to shut down powerplants and manufacturing that
provide good-paying jobs in States like Indiana and in the rest of the
Rust Belt. This straightforward action only received five comments--
five. I have got them right here. Yes, a majority of the comments that
the EPA received were in support of this rule, and the two others were
anonymous comments.
Where was the outrage against this rule and then when the EPA was
accepting comments?
Just to frame how many comments you got, when I did my Congressional
Review Act of the Obama clean powerplant, I got 4.3 million comments;
with the Biden clean powerplant 2.0, 1.3 million comments; with the
Biden WOTUS rule, 115,000; with the California waiver, 53,000.
This is all the people in this country who care about what we are
doing right now. It is just attempting to waste floor time in the U.S.
Senate, trying to reverse a technical correction in an underhanded
effort to close powerplants that provide affordable electricity and
jobs for American workers and help us progress in this race for
superiority in the race to AI. We need more energy, not less; and the
CRA is a deliberate attempt to shut down powerplants in Indiana that
are not popular. They are coal-fired power plants--love it--when grid
reliability experts are warning of a shortage of baseline power.
I am fully against this CRA, and I hope that my colleagues will join
me in that.
[[Page S6633]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
Motion to Proceed
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I move again to proceed to Calendar
No. 142, S.J. Res. 60.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the joint resolution by
title.
The senior assistant executive clerk read as follows:
Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 142, S.J. Res. 60,
providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of
title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the
Environmental Protection Agency relating to ``Emissions
Budget and Allowance Allocations for Indiana Under the
Revised Cross-State Air Pollution Rule Update''.
Vote on Motion to Proceed
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question occurs on agreeing to the motion
to proceed.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk called the roll.
Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the
Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy) and the Senator from Utah (Mr.
Lee).
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 51, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 520 Leg.]
YEAS--47
Alsobrooks
Baldwin
Bennet
Blumenthal
Blunt Rochester
Booker
Cantwell
Coons
Cortez Masto
Duckworth
Durbin
Fetterman
Gallego
Gillibrand
Hassan
Heinrich
Hickenlooper
Hirono
Kaine
Kelly
Kim
King
Klobuchar
Lujan
Markey
Merkley
Murphy
Murray
Ossoff
Padilla
Peters
Reed
Rosen
Sanders
Schatz
Schiff
Schumer
Shaheen
Slotkin
Smith
Van Hollen
Warner
Warnock
Warren
Welch
Whitehouse
Wyden
NAYS--51
Banks
Barrasso
Blackburn
Boozman
Britt
Budd
Capito
Collins
Cornyn
Cotton
Cramer
Crapo
Cruz
Curtis
Daines
Ernst
Fischer
Graham
Grassley
Hagerty
Hawley
Hoeven
Husted
Hyde-Smith
Johnson
Justice
Kennedy
Lankford
Lummis
Marshall
McConnell
McCormick
Moody
Moran
Moreno
Mullin
Murkowski
Paul
Ricketts
Risch
Rounds
Schmitt
Scott (FL)
Scott (SC)
Sheehy
Sullivan
Thune
Tillis
Tuberville
Wicker
Young
NOT VOTING--2
Cassidy
Lee
The motion was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Banks). The Senator from Delaware.
Maiden Speech
Ms. BLUNT ROCHESTER. Mr. President, as America confronts a period of
darkness, still I rise, full of bright hope. Why bright hope? ``Bright
Hope'' was the name of the church that my grandmother attended for 70
years in Philadelphia. But, for me, it is more than just a name. It is
a call to action. It is a feeling. It is what drove me to run for the
U.S. Senate and what keeps me going in my darkest of times.
So once again, I rise with bright hope and tremendous humility to
deliver my maiden speech as Delaware's 58th U.S. Senator. My presence
here would not have been possible without my God, my family, and the
people of the great State of Delaware who have put their trust in me.
The word ``trust'' is important here because this is not a time when
Americans are eager to trust their elected officials. Partisan tensions
are so high right now that we can barely talk to each other, let alone
work together.
So the question is this:
Are we to be one people, bound together by common spirit,
sharing in a common endeavor? Or will we become a divided
nation?
As much as I would like to take credit, those are not my words. They
are the words of the late great Barbara Jordan, the Congresswoman from
Texas, the conscience of her Congress, who, in the midst of our
Nation's bicentennial in 1976, spoke about the ``collective spirit of
our nation,'' about the deeply troubling reality that people did not
trust their government. And she offered a path forward, saying:
For all of its uncertainty, we cannot flee the future.
We must address and master the future together. It can be
done if we restore the belief that we share a sense of
national community.
We are now 50 years removed from the bicentennial, and our present is
rhyming with our past--wars built on false pretense, painful economic
downturns, incomplete recoveries that leave many behind, and Presidents
who abuse their power. The problems persist.
So how do we, before our tricentennial in 2076, build what Barbara
Jordan called our common spirit? How do we restore the belief that a
more perfect union is even possible? How do we rekindle bright hope for
America? These are big questions, but they are not confined to the
Halls of Congress. Go into any coffee shop, a sports game, or a family
home, and Americans are saying the same thing and asking the same
questions. I saw it firsthand in the grocery store about 10 years ago
when a dad with three kids in front of me in line put back a bunch of
grapes because they were too expensive. It shook me to the core.
You see, the year before that, my husband Charles, the love of my
life, played a game of basketball before his business meetings,
ruptured his Achilles tendon, and blood clots went to his heart and
lungs. At the age of 52, the love of my life died, and I was consumed
with grief. But seeing that dad woke me up from my own pain. I would be
OK.
At that moment, I decided I had nothing to lose and everything to
give. Having never run for anything in my life, I decided to run for
Congress. I spread a huge piece of white paper on my living room wall,
and I started to write. I asked: Why me? Why now? What for?
And the answers appeared--three words that have driven me forward,
three words that have given me bright hope: purpose, peace, and planet.
It was clear that if we can help Americans live their purpose, provide
peace, and protect our planet, I believe we will be able to rebuild the
trust we have lost.
It begins with purpose. I am a big believer that a good-paying job or
starting a business can help us find purpose and that the dignity of
work is essential to what it means to be an American.
I have often said that if I had another middle name, it would be Lisa
Blunt ``Jobs'' Rochester. For me, I got my first job at the age of 14,
and I flipped burgers, worked retail. I was a CEO. I even served as
Delaware's secretary of labor. As a matter of fact, in Delaware, a
union leader said to me: You can't spell ``labor'' without ``L-B-R.''
I know jobs. I love jobs. And I can tell you, we need a new and
different approach to jobs in this country, especially as we look to
the future of work in the age of artificial intelligence. With reports
that AI is poised to push unemployment rates upwards of 20 percent in
the next 5 years, we need big, bold solutions now.
Fortunately for us, America has a track record of taking on historic
challenges and transforming them into opportunities for success. When
the Soviet Union started the space race in the 1950s, we pushed
American innovation to new heights. The groundbreaking research from
that era still impacts us today--GPS systems, weather satellites, the
COVID-19 vaccine, even the internet.
We need to harness the innovative spirit that landed us on the Moon
and apply it to our economy. We must mobilize our Nation's leading
labor experts, supply chain strategists, and economic innovators and
pursue the future instead of waiting for it to come to us.
From workforce development and apprenticeship opportunities to
emerging technologies, our common goal must be for everyone to succeed
and find purpose in a rapidly changing economy. Access to economic
opportunity is a good start.
But many families derive their sense of purpose from where they live,
the communities they belong to, the place they call home.
Growing up, my family lived with my grandparents--my mom's mom, my
dad's mom. We lived in apartments. We lived in public housing for a
short time. But I will never forget the exhilaration I felt on the day
we moved into our own home, a place that was truly ours.
[[Page S6634]]
But for millions of Americans, that feeling is out of reach. Instead,
home ownership feels impossible. And the rent in America is too doggone
high. Yet, for too long, the Federal Government has been missing in
action. Our Nation's zoning frameworks date back to the 1920s--100
years ago. Times have changed, and it is time we get back in the game.
That is why, a week ago, I was proud to unveil my very first policy
agenda as a Senator, ``The New Way Home''--a blueprint that will touch
every corner of the housing crisis. Together, we can expand housing
supply, build stronger communities, make housing more attainable,
unlock innovative housing models, and invest in smart tax policy.
Together, we can chart a path to a new way home and help Americans find
purpose, even peace, in the stability that comes with a roof over your
head.
Peace--that is something we all need right now, isn't it?
I studied international relations in college, and I have lived and
traveled and worked in over 30 countries. My son was even born abroad.
I fundamentally believe that we need peace at a global level.
But today, I want to talk about the need for peace at a more personal
level--the peace that comes with knowing our purpose and having a
steady job and a place to call home and the peace that comes when we
can take care of our families.
Not every family looks the same, but we all want the same things:
quality healthcare, affordable childcare, and the comfort of knowing
that Social Security and Medicare will be there for us too.
Last summer, I sat at a kitchen table with a mother of young
children, one with disabilities. She was taking care of her aging
father as well--a role that she inherited from her mother because her
mother passed away from all the stress. And I will never forget the
look of frustration in her eyes. She was drained physically, mentally,
and emotionally from all the administrative hoops and barriers and
things she had to jump through and financially from all the bills she
had to pay. She was barely holding on.
How are we supposed to rebuild trust in our government, rekindle
bright hope in our democracy, when families are struggling to care for
their aging loved ones and their children at the same time? We have
failed the sandwich generation, their children, and their parents as
well.
We now have a patchwork of solutions in States, but we are not
working together as a nation. We have an opportunity to provide peace
of mind and create jobs by investing in childcare and healthcare, but
that is only half the battle. We must also focus on those caring for
aging parents by addressing the urgent shortages in home care and
nursing workforces.
It is also time to revolutionize Medicare, to truly uplift Americans
living in their twilight years, because we all deserve peace of mind,
of knowing that we can retire with dignity.
Ultimately, the solutions are clear. By simplifying access to care
and making it more affordable, we give families the tools they need to
strive while strengthening our economy, and we have the power to give
our families peace of mind.
But none of this will be possible without a planet. Who doesn't want
clean drinking water and clean air? How is this controversial? Yet
there are many communities in America where unsafe water, dirty air,
and playgrounds built on brownfields are still a reality.
In 2022, I was able to work with the Ellendale community in their
decades-long fight for clean drinking water. It is still one of the
proudest moments of my career thus far. But for many across this
country, there are Ellendales everywhere, many communities that still
need champions in this Chamber, especially as we confront the threats
of climate change.
Let me be clear. As the junior Senator from the lowest lying State in
the Nation, from our farms and our beaches to our environmental justice
communities, in Delaware, we know climate change is real. Now is not
the time to pull back from our oversight of Agencies like the EPA and
FEMA; now is the time to lean in. With rising insurance rates pricing
people out of their homes and recordbreaking disaster seasons draining
State and local budgets, the health and wealth of our Nation depends on
our collective action to preserve and protect our environment.
Purpose, peace, planet--this is how we can earn the trust that has
been lost, how we can rekindle bright hope in our democracy, because
when people have a good job, a roof over their head, the ability to
care for their family, and a healthy planet to call home, they will
know they have a government that works for them.
It is on all of us, the people that serve in this Chamber, to meet
this moment. And if we are successful, 50 years from now, as we
celebrate our tricentennial, Americans will not need to read a speech
from 2025 and say these are the challenges of our time, too. They will,
instead, be able to freely write the next chapter of the American
story.
Mr. President, I will end where I began--with bright hope. I often
said: Bright hope shines brightest in the darkness. Right now, a lot of
people are asking me how I still have bright hope in the moment that we
are in.
Well, let me tell you, I have bright hope because God mended my
broken heart after the death of my husband and blessed me with the
opportunity to serve my State and my country. I have bright hope
because I stand here as a descendent of the enslaved men and women who
built this place. I have bright hope because I prayed in the Gallery on
January 6, and I am here, alive, standing firm for democracy and love.
I have bright hope because in the words of the renowned poet Langston
Hughes:
I, too, sing America.
Thank you, Mr. President.
(Applause, Senators rising.)
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Senate Interns
Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, it is by way of real honor to bring the
interns on their shadow day to track my participation in hearings and
speeches and floor votes and conversation with other Senators because
it is really hard for our interns to get a full vision of what we do as
Senators if they are just in the office helping to answer the mail--
because a good share of what they do is writing responses to all the
questions that Oregonians write about.
I will never forget the time I spent with Senator Hatfield when I was
an intern and had a chance to essentially be his floor monitor 49 years
ago. At that time, there was no television on the floor, and there was
no fax machine. Of course, there was no internet. There was no cell
phone. So each Senator had somebody monitoring the debate, and my
assignment was monitoring the debate on the Tax Reform Act of 1976.
There were 125 votes on that. And I sat up in the balcony up here, in
the staff section, with many other staff members. The bells would ring,
and we would run down to where the reporters hang out outside the
double doors now here. I and other staff members would hang out,
waiting for our Senators to come out of the elevator, and brief them
about the amendment that was being considered. Because there was no
television on the floor, folks back in the office had no idea what was
being debated and what folks back home thought about the issue.
So I do appreciate the opportunity to help our interns get a fuller
vision of the work we do here in the Senate.
Government Funding
Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, my reason for coming to the floor now is
to weigh in on Senator Rand Paul's proposed budget.
Now, if we could turn the clock back to the beginning of July, Senate
Republicans passed President Trump's so-called Big Beautiful Bill.
Many of us consider it a big, ugly betrayal because its core message
was that families lose and billionaires win. That was not President
Trump's message during his campaign. During his campaign, he said he
was going to be fighting for families. Then he gets sworn in just down
this hallway in the Rotunda. Who does he have standing behind him?
Champions for families? healthcare? for education? for housing? for
investment in infrastructure? No. Billionaires.
That revealed what he was really up to, and that entire bill hurt
families.
[[Page S6635]]
Why? To fund tax breaks for billionaires. Kicking 15 million Americans
off their health insurance to fund tax breaks for billionaires.
Slashing nutrition assistance for millions of children. Why? In order
to give tax breaks to billionaires. Running up $30 trillion in
additional national debt over the next 30 years. Why? To fund tax
breaks for billionaires. It is pretty astounding that a single Member
of this body would have voted for that bill running up $30 trillion in
debt.
Every single person who gave speeches back home that said ``I am all
about being fiscally responsible''--what could possibly be more
irresponsible than cutting nutrition for children and cutting
healthcare for 15 million Americans in order to make the richest
Americans even richer? It is like the worst possible reason for a
deficit or a debt.
Families lose; billionaires win.
Now Senator Paul has introduced a budget resolution that compounds
that. He says that over the next 10 years, we should cut an additional
$22 trillion out of the programs that serve Americans.
Now, if he had come to the floor and said ``We just passed a bill
that runs up $30 trillion in debt to fund tax breaks for billionaires,
and we are going to take away those tax breaks for billionaires in
order to not run up $30 trillion,'' I would be right with him because
that would be wise. But cutting fundamental programs for families and
our national security?
Now, any responsible budget plan is going to tell you when its cuts
are going to happen. So where does Senator Paul, my good friend from
Kentucky--where does he say those spending cuts will happen? Where will
that $22 trillion come from that he is eliminating over the next 10
years? Well, he doesn't answer the question. He says: I am going to
create a new category in the budget called ``New Efficiencies,
Consolidations, and Other Savings.'' Not one damn detail. How
convenient that is.
I am just going to magically cut $22 trillion out of the spending
over the next 10 years and not say a word about the damage it is going
to do.
This is kind of a replay of what we saw in the reconciliation debate
when our Republican colleagues used magic math and budget gimmicks and
smoke and mirrors to slash programs for families and explode the debt.
Don't we owe it to our constituents, don't we owe it to Americans to
be honest about what is being proposed? So I will tell you where those
cuts are going to come from, something of that size. Well, they are
going to come from Medicare. They are going to come from Medicaid. They
are going to come from child nutrition. They are going to come from
border security. They are going to come from law enforcement. They are
going to come from national defense. They are going to come from
veterans' care. They are going to come from environmental protection
and investments in infrastructure.
Now, if you spread those cuts evenly over the discretionary budget
lines over those 10 years, it cuts 38 percent of what we spend--38
percent. I am pretty sure some of my colleagues will say: Well,
whatever you do, don't cut national defense and certainly don't cut
support for our veterans.
So then what are we talking about? We are talking about a 48-percent
cut in everything else.
OK. So voting for this Rand Paul budget, you are voting for
essentially a 50-percent cut in Medicare, a 50-percent cut in Medicaid,
a 50-percent cut in cancer research, a 50-percent cut on top of the
cuts already made in child nutrition, and a 50-percent cut on
investments in infrastructure. That is what you are voting for, and
that is really beyond damaging to our Nation.
You want to cut Medicare in half? Well, then, put that in the line,
explain what it is, and then vote for it. That would show some courage.
If you really want Medicare cut in half, tell the American people that.
Have the courage of your convictions. Don't hide it behind this funny
line called ``New Efficiencies'' or something of that nature.
Well, there are obviously all these things you can find in the budget
that need to be cut, and there have been some examples given. I am sure
you can find some scientific research that most Americans would look
at, even with full information, and they would say: Oh, yeah, we don't
need to research that.
But, you know, sometimes the insights in science come from the most
unexpected places. For example, there has been some commentary about
silly-sounding Federal grants like studying Gila monster venom. Why
would you study that? Well, then you find out that what was learned
there helped create the drug Ozempic. Well, that is pretty big medical
insight that has huge applications in terms of a variety of diseases
but also in terms of addiction and in terms of weight loss.
You might say: Why would you study bird songs? Well, it turns out
that the study of bird songs led to advances in hearing aid technology,
allows people to distinguish sounds they want to hear from background
noise so they can have a conversation in a crowded room.
I am just saying that I am sure there are individual items that could
be found that sound absurd, but you know what--those are little tiny
pennies. It is not cutting Medicare by 50 percent; it is not cutting
Medicaid by 50 percent.
If you want to cut $22 trillion, cut it out of the tax breaks for
billionaires. That is the real crime done by the families lose;
billionaires win, big, ugly betrayal of a bill. Maybe that is the
budget we should be voting on.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Curtis). The Senator from Kentucky.
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