[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 163 (Friday, October 3, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6925-S6929]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Government Funding
Mr. SCHATZ. Mr. President, Donald Trump is sending $20 billion not to
America but to Argentina. Donald Trump is sending $20 billion to
Argentina to bail out their economy, and he wants to spend $50 billion
to clean up the mess that he made by starting a trade war that crushed
American soybean producers.
Let's be clear about what happened. It is not that the market is
temporarily suspended. That market, in some cases, is gone. And during
this period of time with--$20 billion for the country of Argentina and
$50 billion for a tariff bailout--Americans are paying more for
absolutely everything. Healthcare premiums for tens of millions of
people are going to go up by a lot--not 10 percent, not 20 percent, not
50 percent--114 percent; 24 million Americans, 114 percent.
The bailout for Argentina is particularly absurd. Argentina is not a
key security or economic partner. It is an economy that is in such dire
shape that there is no guarantee that we will ever get our money back.
It is a terrible investment any way you look at it under any
circumstances but certainly in the context of Americans seeing their
healthcare premiums increase by 114 percent right now.
You then have a separate bailout for American soybean producers
totaling close to $50 billion. And why? Because of the tariffs; because
in one fell swoop, they wiped out half of the export market for
American soybeans in China, and there is no way you can plug that gap.
You can't come up with--I don't know what it would be--112 individual
deals to kind of add up to the market-buying power of the PRC.
When you lose a buyer that also happens to be the biggest country in
the world, you don't have a lot of options. At best, it is going to
take you months or years to cut dozens of smaller deals, and it is not
going to add up.
Just to recap, Trump is at the exact same time incinerating $70
billion of taxpayer money. But what is the one thing that there is not
enough money for? You. There is not enough money for you. There is
enough money for a $50 billion tariff bailout; there is enough money
for Argentina; but there is not enough money for you.
They don't have enough money to help a family of four that is going
to have to pay $300 more per month to keep their healthcare plan. They
have the money to cover for Trump's economic incompetence, but,
apparently, they don't have the money to prevent a small business owner
or a taxi driver or an early retiree from losing their healthcare.
This is not complicated at all. Donald Trump's economy is already
hard as it is because of his choices to create shortages of
electricity, of lumber, of food, of healthcare. Electricity prices are
going up at twice the rate of inflation. Vegetables are up nearly 40
percent. Grocery prices are at their highest in 3 years now. People are
supposed to find hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars to spare every
single month or give up their healthcare coverage and hope they don't
get sick.
We could end this shutdown right now if Republicans sat down and
[[Page S6926]]
worked with us to protect people's healthcare. By the way, the people
who are being particularly hurt by these healthcare premium increases
live in Republican States. Now, that shouldn't matter, but we are in
politics. Just understand, we are standing here fighting for your
constituents. If we were a little more cynical, we would let you stew
in the most unpopular major legislation that has been passed in
generations. But we want to solve this problem, not just for the 24
million people on the so-called exchange but for everybody who is about
to see their premiums spike. Let's sit down and fix this.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kentucky.
Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, my position on government shutdowns is
pretty well-known. There is absolutely nothing to gain in taking basic
government functions hostage for eleventh-hour partisan demands.
I hope our Democratic colleagues will relearn that lesson in short
order because the American people have plenty to lose from freezing
important functions of the Federal Government. Here in the Senate, the
Democrat shutdown is taking time we ought to be spending on important
outstanding business, beginning with our obligation to provide for the
common defense. In particular, our work to deliver full-year Defense
appropriations is not finished.
So I would like to talk briefly about what must come next after
interim government funding is extended and what is at stake for our
national security. The U.S. military is not immune from the disruptive
short-term consequences of a government shutdown. But the long-term
consequences of going without robust full-year Defense appropriations
are far, far graver.
I offered this warning in the spring when, for the first time,
Washington told America's men and women in uniform to conduct today's
operations and prepare for tomorrow's threats using yesterday's
dollars. We put the national defense on a full-year continuing
resolution and forced the military services to function for another
year--another year--on the anemic defense budget signed into law by
President Biden.
A full-year CR is the enemy of readiness, modernization, and
efficiency. The armed services want to make their budgets simpler, more
efficient, and more flexible by consolidating budget lines. But they
can't do that under a full-year CR.
Punting new appropriations directly contradicts--directly
contradicts--the Pentagon's stated goal of building a resilient, surge-
ready munitions enterprise. The prohibitions on new program starts
under a CR effectively put high-priority service modernization efforts
literally on ice.
The administration says it wants ``flexible and efficient''
investments. Well, there is nothing flexible, efficient, resilient, or
lethal about running the national defense enterprise on a full-year CR,
nor will a CR send the consistent signal industry and investors need to
pour private capital into the long-overdue expansion of our defense
industrial base. If you want to increase our Nation's capacity to
produce munitions more quickly and in larger volumes, full-year CRs
just might be the worst way to go about it.
I don't mean to sound overly alarmed. God willing, the House-passed,
short-term funding extension will give Congress enough time to deliver
full-year appropriations and release our military from the constraints
of the Biden fiscal year 2024 budget. But I want our colleagues to
understand what is at stake this fall.
The President has set some ambitious, important, and overdue
priorities for America's national security, and none of them--none of
them--come cheap: the Golden Dome for America, an American shipbuilding
renaissance, sixth-generation stealth fighter aircraft, the long-
overdue modernization of our nuclear force. Reconciliation isn't enough
to support these major efforts, and neither is a perpetual freeze at
the Biden fiscal year 2024 level.
Reviving the warrior ethos, rebuilding the military, reestablishing
deterrence--these are priorities we hear about all the time from the
President's advisers. I certainly have no problem with rowing in that
direction. I am all for high standards of physical fitness, but pushups
alone--pushups alone--aren't going to stop Chinese hypersonic missiles.
The next major conflict will likely be a test of lethality at very long
distances.
That is why I have spent years urging successive administrations to
rebuild--rebuild--our global power projection and long-range fires. It
is why I criticized the Biden administration for talking about China as
the ``pacing threat'' but turning in defense budget requests that
didn't even keep pace with inflation.
The administration cannot afford to make this same mistake. So, this
week, I was encouraged to hear Secretary Hegseth proclaim a ``Trump
buildup'' in the mold of the Reagan buildup that helped end the Cold
War. For the record, my fellow defense appropriators and I have been
ready to deliver such a buildup since day one, and our bipartisan bill
speaks for itself in putting money where our mouth is.
Ah, but here is the rub: We can only make it happen if the
administration moves from words to action, and an important step in
that process is the national defense strategy.
Historically, the national defense strategy is what administrations
use to define threats, identify objectives, and propose coherent plans
for aligning resources to actually meet them. But this time around, the
stakes are a lot higher. A shortsighted NDS that doesn't align with the
President's vision of American greatness and peace through strength
could wind up as the pretext to extend Biden-era constraints on our
military indefinitely.
Unfortunately, early reports suggest that this risk may be real and
that the NDS may turn out eerily similar to the rhetoric of Obama-era
officials' who viewed their remit as managing America's decline amid a
transition to a multipolar world.
If the NDS ignores the importance of maintaining American primacy,
fails to account for the global nature of competition with China, or
discounts the value of supporting and integrating allies and partners,
it would risk further sabotaging the President's efforts to restore
peace through strength.
So I will be interested to read how the Department is applying the
lessons and dividends of security cooperation with allies and partners
to looming challenges, how it plans to address critical munitions
shortages even as its fiscal year 2026 request and reconciliation
investment fails to maximize existing production capacity, and how it
accounts for the increased likelihood of simultaneous conflict in
multiple theaters.
If the administration means what it says about restoring deterrence,
it would recognize how plans to reduce security cooperation with
frontline NATO allies invite more brazen Russian incursions into the
alliance's territory and airspace; it would recognize how China is
watching closely for signs of weakening American commitments to
European allies, to Ukraine, or to AUKUS partners.
Of course, responsible senior officials who understood the dividends
of security cooperation would not have tried an end run around the
President to freeze assistance to Ukraine. They certainly would have
appreciated that cutting off intelligence sharing to the world's
foremost experts in drone warfare might make it harder for the U.S.
military to achieve drone dominance.
On that count, I was encouraged earlier this week that the President
himself green-lit an expansion of the intelligence cooperation that
members of his administration had actually wanted to end.
As our colleagues will recall, the President observed last month that
Ukraine can win--the President said Ukraine can win--and unlike some of
his advisers, the American people are indicating in clear majorities
that they think we ought to help.
By one recent poll, more than 6 in 10 Americans support--support--
sending more arms and military supplies to help Ukraine win. That
includes--listen to this: A clear majority of Republicans support
helping Ukraine. And the recent voting history of the House of
Representatives indicates that poll isn't a fluke. Last month, House
Republicans voted overwhelmingly--House Republicans voted
overwhelmingly--to reject an amendment to the NDAA that would have
barred further
[[Page S6927]]
assistance to Ukraine. Listen to this: 72 percent of House
Republicans--72 percent of House Republicans--including House
leadership, said that continuing to arm Ukraine's defense was a good
idea.
So the public is behind it. Republicans in Congress are behind it. We
know it is the right thing to do.
Ultimately, the President knows that money talks. He understands that
valuable things are expensive. What is true in property development is
also true in military procurement. There is no way around it. Take the
Golden Dome for example. Building anything close to a continental
missile defense shield will, by reasonable estimates, cost several
times more than was allocated this year in one-off reconciliation
spending, every year, for decades to come.
If the Pentagon isn't even planning to max out its budget request for
procuring critical munitions in the short term, why on Earth should our
adversaries take any talk of long-term missile defense seriously?
Likewise, why should they take American airpower seriously if we are
only willing to develop sixth-generation stealth fighters for the Air
Force but not for the Navy?
What good are multibillion-dollar aircraft carriers if we are not
prepared to equip them with aircraft that can survive modern warfare?
At home and abroad, I am concerned that too many of the President's
advisers are unwilling to acknowledge the gap between his stated
priorities and what they are prepared to invest to achieve them. If you
ask me, the name on the front door at the Pentagon matters a great deal
less than whether the services inside are equipped and prepared to
deter and win wars, and we are facing real, glaring gaps in critical
capabilities.
The ink was barely dry on the One Big Beautiful Bill when senior
Pentagon officials began to report to my colleagues and I on the
Appropriations Committee that they still faced significant funding
shortfalls. Given the high pace of operations in the Middle East and in
the Western Hemisphere, it is safe to assume these costs are only going
to continue to rise.
So there is a lot going on around this building, but, soon, I hope
our colleagues will have an opportunity to go on record in favor of
investing in peace through strength. We will have a chance to put our
money where our mouth is on reestablishing deterrence and rebuilding
the force required to back it up. Our investments in the common defense
are a signal of our national resolve.
When the American people spoke last November, I don't think they
meant for their leaders to mail in a third year of anemic--anemic--
Biden-era top lines. I don't think the President assembled his policy
and budget advisers with a mind to punt in the face of looming threats.
When he hired civilian Pentagon leaders to restore deterrence, I think
he meant more than just threatening adversaries with a catchy line on
camera; I think he meant building the force that threatens them with
its very existence.
So if the administration wants a Trump buildup, then let's build one,
and once the Democrats' shutdown is over, let's start with serious,
increased, full-year investments in our national defense.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Moody). The majority whip.
Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, America is now in the middle of the
Schumer shutdown. Two in three Americans oppose it. Democrats are
holding the American people hostage. They are demanding $1.5 trillion
in new spending, and that is just to keep the government open for 4
short weeks. That amounts to $48 billion a day.
Here is what the Democrats are demanding. They are demanding more
taxpayer-funded healthcare for illegal immigrants. At the same time,
they are taking away money from vulnerable hospitals in rural
communities in my State and in yours.
Under Joe Biden, Democrats opened our borders. Ten million illegal
immigrants flooded across. Under Chuck Schumer, Democrats have now
closed the government. They did it to give free healthcare to illegal
immigrants.
Meanwhile, Democrats are demanding the repeal of $50 billion of the
rural hospital fund. This has been set aside as a lifesaver for our
small community hospitals. That is who this fund has been set up to
help, like the one I was at last week, in Pinedale, WY.
It is our first hospital in the county, ever. The closest hospital is
85 miles away. This is a needed, vital resource in rural Wyoming.
In addition, Democrats are demanding $350 billion in permanent new
spending for Biden's bonus COVID payments. They created these payments
in 2021. They promised they would be temporary. They said they are
there for the COVID emergency only. They extended them once so they
would end at the end of this year. Clearly, COVID is over, and now they
want these Biden bonus COVID payments to become permanent, to go on
forever.
These payments are riddled with waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption.
We have seen it. We have documented evidence.
Unlike most insurance, there are no premiums, there are no
deductibles. Democrats also removed the income limit. The money goes
straight from the government to the insurance companies. The bill goes
directly to the hard-working American taxpayers.
The Democrats' price to reopen the government is all of those things
I have mentioned, plus more.
What we are doing as Republicans is proposing to reopen the
government for 7 weeks at the current funding levels. The House has
already passed it. Republicans and Democrats have voted for it in the
House and in the Senate. President Trump is ready to sign it.
It takes 60 votes in the Senate to reopen the government. We have
voted repeatedly over the past several days. Each time, a few level-
headed Democrats have joined Republicans in the vote. It is time for
more Democrats to join us today.
There is only one person standing in the way, and that is the
minority leader. He is holding the American people hostage. He fears
retribution from the radical, socialist left. It is easy to see why.
The radical socialist left--including Senator Sanders, Senator Warren,
and AOC--they have become the Democrat leaders in this shutdown. They
are the ones running the party.
While the government is stuck in this Schumer shutdown, the people
paying the price are the American families. Veterans will face longer
wait times for appointments. Members of the military and Border Patrol
agents will continue to protect our Nation, but they will do it without
pay. Some wildfire prevention, which is critical this time of the year,
will stop. Wildland firefighters will remain on the job unpaid. Mothers
will lose access to vital programs that help feed their children. Sick
patients on Medicare and Medicaid may lose home healthcare services.
Small business owners will not receive new Federal loans because the
Small Business Administration is unable, during a shutdown, to process
them.
The American people, all across this country, are feeling the pain of
the Schumer shutdown. Their request is simple. They are asking Senate
Democrats to do what they have done 13 times under Joe Biden--to vote
for a clean continuing resolution that will reopen the government. All
it takes is a few more Democrats--people who are willing to put the
country first.
We are about to vote today on another clean continuing resolution,
like the Democrats did 13 times when Joe Biden was in the White House,
and that is the one to reopen the government. Republicans are going to
vote for it.
Democrats have the opportunity today, in just a few short minutes, to
do the right thing for the American people. Let's see if they do.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, here we go again. Three days ago,
Democrats voted against a stopgap spending bill that would keep the
government open for the benefit of 320 million American citizens. But
because they voted against it, we are now in a government shutdown--
something that should be a profound embarrassment to them, as it is to
the rest of us who believe we were sent here to govern, not
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to shut down the government and deny our own constituents access to the
services that government necessarily provides in some cases.
If you listen to the media--not all of the media, but some of the
media, particularly the sympathetic, leftwing media--you might think
otherwise. But make no mistake about it. The blame for this government
shutdown lies squarely on the Senate Democrats' shoulders.
Three Democrats voted to reopen the government the last time we
voted, and other Democrats--we need five more--will have a chance to
vote here in just a few minutes to reopen the government and to stop
this charade.
But the facts of the matter are pretty straightforward. The reason we
are in a government shutdown is because Senate Democrats refuse to vote
for what is known around here as a clean continuing resolution, a clean
CR.
As I mentioned, this is a stopgap procedure so we can then finish the
work of the appropriations bills by November and, hopefully, pass
bipartisan funding bills that will last for the remainder of the fiscal
year, while we are doing other important work as well--hopefully, a
National Defense Authorization bill; hopefully, other important
legislation.
So why hold 320 million Americans hostage by denying them the
benefits that their government is providing by shutting down the
government? Why in the world would you do that?
I think, primarily, that this is because our friends on the other
side of the aisle are afraid of their base supporters. We know that
last time, the Democratic leader, Senator Schumer, the Senator from New
York, agreed to a short-term CR, which we did 13 previous times because
it is a stopgap spending bill. The last time he agreed to a continuing
resolution, he was pummeled by his Democratic base, and he is worried
that if he does that again, without shutting down the government,
without showing some fight, he will be ousted out of his position as a
Democratic leader and maybe even defeated in his next primary election
by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, AOC.
But let's consider the consequences of this shutdown for some of the
most vulnerable Americans, our seniors who rely on the Medicare
hospital-at-home program and telehealth. Because of the government
shutdown, CMS no longer has the authority to reimburse certain
telehealth services.
Most of us were not particularly acquainted with telehealth before
COVID, but Congress decided to reimburse healthcare providers for
providing virtual visits with your doctors. In some cases, that is all
people needed access to. So it is an important adjunct or supplement to
our healthcare system. But that is no longer available because of the
shutdown.
This will have a particularly severe impact on patients without
access to reliable transportation, who will not be able to see their
doctor unless they can get access to telehealth.
Additionally, providers who participated in the Medicare hospital-at
home program no longer have the authority to deliver inpatient-level
care in patients' homes. I know we are all concerned about the costs of
healthcare, but if you can treat people in their homes, that is
obviously a better place for the patient, and it is less costly
healthcare. But that authority expired with the shutdown of the Federal
Government. This means some of our most vulnerable Americans, sick and
bedridden seniors, have been left without care or were unexpectedly
forced to be transported to overcrowded hospitals when it may not be in
their best interest to actually engage in that transport.
These are just examples of the real-life consequences of the
unnecessary shutdown imposed on the American people by Senate
Democrats, holding the American people hostage for their partisan
political demands, which I will get to in a moment.
Democrats want Americans to believe that this is just about
healthcare. They know that the particular healthcare benefit that they
are most concerned about is a COVID-era plus-up of the Affordable Care
Act's subsidies that were started back during the Biden administration.
So even if these plussed-up benefits were to expire, people would not
be denied the access to the Affordable Care Act if they happened to
have a policy using that particular program.
So there is no imminent threat to these people or anyone else if we
don't address it in the context of this shutdown. So it is a made-up
crisis. We know that these provisions expire at the end of this
calendar year, and there will be time--and we will take the time--to
deal with those, as we should. But based on many of the stories of
waste, fraud, and abuse associated with these plussed-up, COVID-era
Biden subsidies for the Affordable Care Act, there is an important
reason why we should take our time and look at these and reform them
where necessary, and that is what we intend to do.
If Senate Democrats really cared about ensuring that the most
vulnerable patients in America got access to healthcare, they would
never have shut down the government. This shutdown is obviously not
about healthcare if they are actually making healthcare worse by
shutting down the government. It is simply a way for the Democratic
leader to posture at length for his far-left progressive base.
It is unconscionable, if you think about it, that Democrats are
holding the American people hostage and some of the very people they
claim to be helping get access to healthcare. Yet they are framing it
as though, somehow, Republicans are forcing partisan demands.
But the House has already passed a continuing resolution. The only
thing stopping this from making its way to President Trump's desk is a
vote in the Senate. And we need 60 votes in the Senate, under Senate
rules, and, right now, three Democrats have joined with virtually all
Republicans to vote for this continuing resolution, which only will
take us to November 20, to give us time to do the other appropriations
bills that I mentioned a moment ago.
But the reason why I call the Democrats' demand a partisan wish list
is because they are asking for the Sun and the Moon.
First of all, starting with their proposal, anybody listening is
reminded of the fact that we just recently passed the One Big Beautiful
Bill--since rebranded to the ``Working Families Tax Cut Act.'' But the
proposal made by the Democrats in their alternative continuing
resolution says they want to repeal it. They want to repeal the One Big
Beautiful Bill, which cut taxes for every American, doubled the child
tax credit, and provided innumerable benefits to the American people
primarily by avoiding about a $3,000 tax increase per family. They want
to repeal it.
One of the provisions we made in that bill was to limit illegal
aliens' access to Medicaid because some States were gaming the Medicaid
Program. Not to get bogged down in the details too much, but this is a
State-Federal program, and under the Affordable Care Act, the Federal
Government pays 90 percent of the Medicaid.
Now, Democrats say: Well, it is illegal to provide free healthcare to
illegal aliens under existing law, and it is. But what Democrats were
doing in places like California, they were using that 10 percent State
share to fund healthcare services for illegal aliens. And the One Big
Beautiful Bill, the Working Families Tax Cut Act, put an end to that.
So Democrats want to repeal that bill.
They also want to repeal the $50 billion rural healthcare
stabilization fund. Texas is a big State. We have urban areas; we have
suburbs; and we have rural areas. We need to make sure that people
living in rural areas--or, certainly, outside of urban and suburban
areas--get access to healthcare. One of the things we did in the One
Big Beautiful Bill is provide a $50 billion stabilization fund to make
sure they could get access to healthcare. But Democrats want to give
that away. They want to repeal that bill in its entirety.
I have heard Democrats on TV and on social media say: We don't want
to provide free healthcare to illegal aliens. But again, this is the
provision that they want to change. They want to repeal this provision,
``Alien Medicaid Eligibility,'' which limited the ability to game the
Medicaid Program, the State contribution to a State-Federal shared
program to fund healthcare for illegal aliens.
Now, we know that there are a lot of reasons why people come to the
country--our country--illegally. Many are drawn because they want to
work. We
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understand they want a better life. We understand that. But the right
way to do that is through legal channels, not through illegal channels.
But one of the magnets that draws people to come to the country is
access to taxpayer-provided free benefits, like free healthcare.
But the States like California that game the Medicaid system are the
worst offenders when it comes to providing free access to healthcare
using this Medicaid Program. But this is the provision that Democrats
now want to repeal, the prohibition we passed in the One Big Beautiful
Bill, the Working Families Tax Cut Act.
What is more, Democrats are asking us to spend billions of dollars in
new spending because they won't vote for a stopgap spending measure. So
we know that the Affordable Care Act subsidies--in other words,
ObamaCare--are enormously expensive.
I won't spend much time here talking about the false promises upon
which ObamaCare was sold: If you like your policy, you can keep it; if
you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor; and actually the claim
that it lowered healthcare expenditures. None of that was true. And
Democrats want to put those subsidies on steroids through the Biden-
era, COVID, supercharged subsidy program. And they want to do it not
just temporarily; they want to do it for the next 10 years, which will
result in hundreds of billions--even a trillion-dollar-plus--of new
spending.
Now, one of the things that we did in the One Big Beautiful Bill was
we passed $400 billion in deficit reduction. Why is that important?
Because our country now owes roughly $37 trillion. We are $37 trillion
in debt. And if we don't do something about that, we are going to be in
deep trouble in the not-too-distant future. Right now, we pay more
money on interest on the national debt than we do on defense, in a very
dangerous world. That is unsustainable, and that is dangerous.
But the Democrats want to forget all that and spend hundreds of
billions of dollars in new spending on a short-term, 9-week stopgap
spending measure. And they say: If you won't agree with us, we are
going to shut down the government.
The kind of spending Democrats have asked for would effectively erase
all the savings we achieved through the commonsense spending reforms in
the One Big Beautiful Bill. It is unconscionable that Senate Democrats
are hurting the American people because they want more spending for
their pet programs. Yet they are framing it as though Republicans are
the ones forcing partisan demands.
That is false. All we are asking them to do is to keep the government
open and pass the short-term continuing resolution that has already
been passed by the House of Representatives.
The Democratic leader said, 2 days ago, on the floor:
Republicans have tried to stick us with a partisan CR that
fails to protect Americans' healthcare.
Three days ago, the vice chair of the Appropriations Committee said:
Instead of talking with us about addressing healthcare . .
. Republicans decided to pass a partisan continuing
resolution.
Again, that is false. They said they don't want to fund illegal
aliens. They say it is a partisan continuing resolution we insist on.
Both of those are false. The continuing resolution proposed by
Republicans has already passed the House of Representatives. It does
not include partisan demands.
If Democrats do not want to pass a clean continuing resolution, what
are they proposing? Well, a partisan continuing resolution. And I have
talked about some of the provisions. The alternative continuing
resolution that Democrats are proposing would not only repeal the One
Big Beautiful Bill, effectively, but they make other partisan demands
on top of that. The Democrat CR would eliminate provisions of the One
Big Beautiful Bill that are critical to putting our fiscal condition
back on track, as I mentioned a moment ago.
In the Medicaid Program, we tightened eligibility. We added work
requirements for able-bodied adults. We required stricter eligibility
reporting and ensured that illegal immigrants do not get free
healthcare benefits. The One Big Beautiful Bill was a critical step
toward ensuring that Medicaid is there for the people who truly need
it: the elderly, children, the disabled, not able-bodied adults.
Democrats have claimed over and over again they are not attempting to
fund healthcare for illegal aliens, but as I have demonstrated, that is
not true. Their proposed continuing resolution repeals the exact
provisions of the One Big Beautiful Bill that prevented illegal aliens
from receiving those benefits.
Just for those who want to read it for themselves, this is section
2141 of the Democrats' proposed continuing resolution. It strikes
section 71109 of the One Big Beautiful Bill. This is a provision that
limits eligibility requirements and Federal payments to States that
allow medical assistance for illegal aliens.
Medicaid has always been intended to be a lifeline to the most
vulnerable Americans when it comes to their health insurance, but over
the last decades it has become bloated with waste, fraud, and abuse. We
cannot continue to serve the most vulnerable Americans for whom
Medicaid was originally designed if we are going to be subsidizing
other people, like able-bodied adults, who should be capable of
contributing themselves. Further, extending these subsidies without
reform would continue contributing to the ballooning costs of
healthcare, now roughly 18 percent of our entire economy.
This is the same problem we have had with ballooning costs in higher
education. The more the government subsidizes, the more bloated that
industry becomes; and, consequently, the providers raise prices, and
those services become less affordable to ordinary middle-class
Americans who would not otherwise rely on government benefits.
The Republican reforms to Medicaid in the One Big Beautiful Bill put
the most vulnerable Americans first, but Democrats have refused to vote
for a clean continuing resolution and, instead, demanded that
Republicans repeal these monumental reforms before allowing the lights
to stay on.
Democrats are also demanding to extend the enhanced Affordable Care
Act subsidies, which are really Obamacare on steroids, which don't even
expire until the end of this year. We will get to that, believe me,
before the end of the year, but to hold this short-term stopgap
spending bill hostage is really unconscionable.
To anyone who says that Republicans are proposing a partisan
continuing resolution while Democrats are doing everything they can to
keep the government open, I hope I have made it clear that the reality
is just the opposite. Republicans do not want a shutdown.
Shutdowns don't benefit anybody, and the same problem that caused the
government to shut down is there staring you in the face when
government is reopened. I think we have learned that from hard
experience.
A poison pill-packed continuing resolution is simply not the
solution. So I hope we can get five more Democrats to join three other
Democrats who have already voted to keep the government open to vote
this afternoon in just a few minutes and reopen the government for the
benefit of all Americans.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.
Mr. SULLIVAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak up to
10 minutes prior to the scheduled rollcall vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
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