[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 151 (Tuesday, September 16, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6635-S6637]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SETTING FORTH THE CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET FOR THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT
FOR FISCAL YEAR 2026 AND SETTING FORTH THE APPROPRIATE BUDGETARY LEVELS
FOR FISCAL YEARS 2027 THROUGH 2035--Motion to Proceed
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce a budget that
balances over 5 years. My budget, the Six Penny Plan, the Six Penny
Plan budget, cuts 6 percent of all spending to rebalance in just 5
years.
I am able to introduce this budget because neither Republicans nor
Democrats introduced a budget this year. So we are running a $7
trillion government without a budget this year. So I think it is
important that we have at least some debate and vote on a budget.
Most Republicans say they are for a balanced budget amendment. Most
of them have voted for it at some point in time. Yet most of the
budgets and most of the spending that go through here seem to be adding
to the debt, not canceling it out.
Since I was elected, Congress has passed a budget less than half of
the time. For almost five decades, Congress has passed all required
annual appropriations bills only four times. So four times in 50 years
has Congress actually gone through and individually passed the
appropriations bills. As a consequence, the looting of the American
taxpayer continues.
By promising yet another so-called clean continuing resolution,
Republicans are doubling down on embracing what they once considered to
be reckless spending levels.
Today, I propose a clear path back towards fiscal responsibility. I
urge the Senate to adopt my Six Penny Plan that will balance the
Federal budget.
This year, the United States will spend $6.7 trillion while bringing
in about $4.7 trillion. That is $2 trillion more being spent than what
is coming in. A deficit of this magnitude should be concerning enough
even on its own merits. But to add insult to injury, Congress passed a
budget just 5 months ago which set a spending cap of almost $6 trillion
for the year. So 5 months ago, Congress did actually pass a budget--
halfway through the year we were already in--to spend $6 trillion this
year. Turns out, though, we have spent $6.6 trillion. So we couldn't
even get it right 6 months ago when the vast majority of Republicans
voted for a budget that said they were going to spend $6 trillion in a
year that was half over, and now they have spent $6.6 trillion.
Next year, it is going to be even worse. The budget that was passed
in the spring said we would spend $6.3 trillion next year, but it turns
out it is going to be $7.2 trillion next year.
What is going on here? We keep passing budgets. We keep saying we are
going to get better. We keep saying the bills we are passing are making
the deficit less. Yet the deficit keeps getting worse.
[[Page S6636]]
So even when Congress passes a budget, they seem to immediately
renege on the deal they just passed. The numbers in the budget end up
not being of consequence because the spending goes on unabated.
This week, Congress will likely vote on locking in spending levels.
The spending levels will be the same spending levels that Republicans
criticized as the Biden spending levels last December. So when there
was a Democrat in the White House, when President Biden was there, all
the Republicans were unified in saying ``We despise the Biden spending
levels. We are against spending in deficit and deficit spending. We are
against all of that''--until the Republicans got in charge, and 3
months later, they voted for the exact same levels.
The continuing resolution from March of this year is the exact same
levels as the Biden spending levels. What are we going to vote for in a
couple of days here? The Biden spending levels again. What does that
lead to? Two trillion dollars in deficit.
So every time we vote for a continuing resolution, for continuing the
spending at the same level, we are voting for a level of spending that
is $2 trillion short of what comes in.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, enacting a yearlong
CR--continuing resolution--will result in blowing through next year's
spending target by nearly $1 trillion.
So the target that was passed last spring was 6.3, but the spending
is actually going to be 7.2. How can you be off a trillion dollars? How
can you with a straight face go home and say: Oh, well, we were just
off a trillion.
And this year, we don't have a budget because--I don't know--maybe
our math was so bad last year, we decided not to do it. But the deficit
next year is going to be $2.1 trillion.
It is getting worse, not better. Next year's deficit will be $100
billion more than the deficit this year.
It was not that long ago that Republicans were castigating the Biden
administration and saying they were reckless. Now we are doing the same
thing.
It was not that long ago that Republicans argued to the American
people that Biden's overspending inevitably was causing inflation; it
was to blame for the rise in the cost of goods. Anybody remember
Bidenomics? Anybody remember Biden inflation? It was accurate because
it was based on debt, and debt causes inflation. When the Federal
Reserves buys the debt and monetizes the debt, that recreates
inflation.
But the same thing is happening. Nothing has changed. A new party in
charge, and the same spending and the same debt.
It wasn't that long ago that conservatives were staunchly opposed to
raising the debt ceiling, and only the unholy alliance between
Democrats and Big Government Republicans would get the spending bills
through, would get the debt ceiling through.
But now it has evaporated. Virtually the entire Republican Party now
supports this debt. On an inauspicious day, March 15 of this year, the
Republican continuing resolution was signed into law. On the Ides of
March, Republicans took ownership of the Biden spending levels. The
Biden spending levels are now Republican spending levels.
To make matters worse, this summer, Republicans voted to raise the
debt ceiling by $5 trillion. We have never ever voted to raise the debt
ceiling that much. It used to be the conservative line that we held the
line and said: We are not doing that or, if we are going to raise the
debt ceiling, we are going to do it in a small amount for a short
period of time in order that we would discuss this again and again and
again until we get it right.
But Republicans now own the spending problem. Republicans now own the
debt expansion. Republicans must rediscover our principles of fiscal
responsibility. Our country's future depends on it.
Our national debt now stands at $37 trillion and grows with each
passing second. If you have ever seen the usdebtclock.org, the website,
the numbers are spinning literally out of control. To put this debt in
perspective, every American household is on the hook for over $238,000
to cover Uncle Sam's reckless spending spree.
To put it bluntly, the state of our Nation's fiscal health is bleak.
The government now spends over a trillion dollars just on interest.
This is more than we spend on our national defense.
We should heed this fact as a warning. As Hoover Institution
Historian Niall Ferguson points out, ``Any great power that spends more
on debt service than on defense will not stay great for very long.''
We must act now if America is to, once again, be a rising nation, but
we are currently on a path toward decline. If we continue down this
unsustainable path, American families will be forced to deal with even
higher inflation, confiscatory tax rates, rising interest, and a weak
economy. It will be harder to find a job and provide for your family
because the deals made in the Halls of Congress always stick the
taxpayers with the bill. You either are going to have to pay for it
through taxes--the debt will always be paid either through taxes or
through inflation and high prices at the grocery store.
Government spending and fiscal malfeasance have not only weakened
every American family's purchasing power, but our national economy is
weaker as well. At $37 trillion, the Federal debt is nearly twice what
it was 10 years ago. The Federal debt is now larger than the entire
economy. Our economy is about $29 trillion; the debt is at $37 trillion
or, to put it in more tangible terms, the U.S. debt is large enough to
fill 34 NFL stadiums with $100 bills.
Government spending is so out of control that even if every bank
account in the United States were emptied to pay down our debt, it
would only cover just about half of what Washington owes. So if
everybody's bank account was liquidated in the whole country, it only
would pay for half of the debt.
This is an amazing problem. This is an extraordinary problem.
Something must be done.
America is in a historic state of financial disarray. Right after the
end of World War II, the world's most expensive war, our accumulated
debt was 18 percent larger than the entire economy. We are now 20
percent. So we have now exceeded even the debt of World War II.
America's leading financial minds have already sounded the alarm. The
Chairman of the Federal Reserve said that Federal spending is on an
unsustainable path, and it is past time for Congress to correct it.
The CEO of JPMorgan Chase, America's largest bank, warned that the
Federal Government must reduce its deficits before lenders finally say
enough and stop loaning the government money.
Just this week, the Director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget
Office suggested that the U.S. economy is weakening. The people who
rank our credit have downgraded the U.S. credit rating.
As interest payments on the national debt crowd out the rest of the
government's budget, entitlement cuts, inflation, and eventually
default on the debt are what lie ahead for the American economy.
Unfortunately, a debt crisis will not just stop with our economy. A
threat to our financial security is also a threat to our national
security. We must remember that the surest path to peace is leaving no
doubt in your adversary's mind about your ability to respond with
aggression.
With increasingly dubious financial health and a larger share of
resources devoted to interest payments, the United States is sending a
message of weakness.
Yet Congress has reportedly chosen to ignore the deficit, raise the
debt ceiling, and continue to fund foreign wars. Instead of budgeting,
Congress decided to kick the difficult decisions down the
road. Unfortunately, continuing spending at the Biden administration
levels is a path that is not sustainable and will further our fiscal
decay with $2 trillion annual deficits as far as the eye can see.
Since entering the Senate, I have introduced several proposals to
lead us back to a balanced Federal budget. In 2017, I introduced a
budget that would freeze spending. In 2017, if you simply froze
spending--you didn't cut one penny from anything, but you froze
spending for 5 years--we would have balanced in 5 years just by
freezing spending.
I introduced a budget a few years later, and it would have taken one
penny--1 percent across the board
[[Page S6637]]
would balance in 5 years. A few years later, I introduced it again; it
was a two-penny plan. Then came the pandemic. We spent so much money.
We closed the economy down. We did such terrible things to the country,
and now it is a six-penny plan. It takes a 6-percent cut.
How can we possibly survive a 6-percent cut?
I will tell you how I present it to people. I have people come in.
They always have something that seems to be of value for people. I will
give you an example. The folks that come in and they are looking for
Alzheimer's research. I have family members with Alzheimer's. I have a
great deal of sympathy. I look at them and tell them where we are, and
I tell them we are a rich country; we ought to have some government
money researching Alzheimer's. And I say: You know, we are $2 trillion
short this year. If we cut everybody by 6 percent, we will be able to
balance the budget. So the Alzheimer's research, we spend $100 million
on. If next year we spend $94 million and we did that for everyone, we
could balance the budget.
Interestingly, people who are emotionally involved with this--moms,
dads, grandparents with Alzheimer's--look at me and say: You know what?
For the good of the country, we can do that.
Yet if you talk to people around here, they go: Oh, you hate old
people. I don't hate old people. I aspire to be an old person.
The thing is, you have to have a little bit of a haircut for every
program up here. If you just cut one program, you will never get
through it. You have to cut everything all across the board, not
because you don't like the recipients, not because you don't want to
help people, but because you don't want to destroy our country.
For just six pennies on the dollar, we can reverse this dismal
trajectory. In just 5 years, we can restore trust in the U.S. dollar,
the U.S. economy, and steer the U.S. Government away from this fiscal
cliff. History will remember who had the courage to stand up to make
these hard choices. History will remember those who chose not to leave
this enormous bill to their children.
Vote yes on this plan. Vote yes on restoring fiscal sanity. Vote yes
on securing the future for our country.
Motion to Proceed
Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 159, S. Con. Res.
22.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 159, S. Con. Res. 22, a
concurrent resolution setting forth the congressional budget
for the United States Government for fiscal year 2026 and
setting forth the appropriate budgetary levels for fiscal
years 2027 through 2035.
Vote on Motion
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to
proceed.
Mr. PAUL. 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 legislative 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 36, nays 62, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 521 Leg.]
YEAS--36
Banks
Barrasso
Blackburn
Britt
Budd
Cornyn
Crapo
Cruz
Curtis
Daines
Ernst
Fischer
Grassley
Hagerty
Hoeven
Husted
Hyde-Smith
Johnson
Kennedy
Lankford
Lummis
Marshall
McCormick
Moody
Moran
Moreno
Paul
Ricketts
Risch
Schmitt
Scott (FL)
Scott (SC)
Sheehy
Thune
Tillis
Tuberville
NAYS--62
Alsobrooks
Baldwin
Bennet
Blumenthal
Blunt Rochester
Booker
Boozman
Cantwell
Capito
Collins
Coons
Cortez Masto
Cotton
Cramer
Duckworth
Durbin
Fetterman
Gallego
Gillibrand
Graham
Hassan
Hawley
Heinrich
Hickenlooper
Hirono
Justice
Kaine
Kelly
Kim
King
Klobuchar
Lujan
Markey
McConnell
Merkley
Mullin
Murkowski
Murphy
Murray
Ossoff
Padilla
Peters
Reed
Rosen
Rounds
Sanders
Schatz
Schiff
Schumer
Shaheen
Slotkin
Smith
Sullivan
Van Hollen
Warner
Warnock
Warren
Welch
Whitehouse
Wicker
Wyden
Young
NOT VOTING--2
Cassidy
Lee
The motion was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
____________________