[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 114 (Tuesday, July 14, 2026)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3919-S3924]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2027--Motion to
Proceed
Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 436, S.
4784.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the bill by title.
The bill clerk read as follows:
Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 436, S. 4784, a bill to
authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2027 for military
activities of the Department of Defense, for military
construction, and for defense activities of the Department of
Energy, to prescribe military personnel strengths for such
fiscal year, and for other purposes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
Remembering Lindsey Graham
Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. President, I rise to pay tribute to my colleague but,
most of all, to my friend, Senator Lindsey Graham.
We were all shocked to learn of his passing this weekend, and I mean
it--stunned. It is hard to imagine the Senate without Lindsey. It
already seems quieter. We will miss his humor, his advice, and, of
course, his friendship.
Lindsey was dedicated to serving the people of South Carolina and the
Nation. He spent nearly his entire adult life in public service, from
the military to the South Carolina House, to the past 31 years--31
years--here, both in the House and in the Senate. In having spent 33
years in the Air Force, the South Carolina Air Guard, or the Reserves,
Senator Graham was a staunch supporter of our men and women in uniform.
Since 2010, he served as co-chair of the National Guard Caucus. With
his help, we were able to successfully convince the Department of
Defense to change its policy and allow guardsmen and reservists to
concurrently receive their Federal tuition assistance and their GI bill
benefits in full.
Given our close, personal friendship and his ardent support of our
servicemembers, our national defense, and our military, I liked to call
him ``Grambo.'' For me, that was his nickname, ``Grambo''--you know,
kind of like ``Rambo.'' Well, he was ``Grambo.'' He really was the
Senate version of ``Rambo'' in all things military, and he was
relentless, as we saw. I mean, right up until almost the day he died,
he was working and advocating for our military, on behalf of American
military strength, and our role as, truly, the leader of the free
world.
As chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, Senator Graham advanced
conservative causes that have made our Nation stronger and more
prosperous. He helped steer through the Working Families Tax--the One
Big Beautiful Bill, or the OB3. It has got a lot of names, but the
important point is that it really made a huge difference for our
country and for working families. He cared about that. He cared about
taking on the big challenges and doing big things.
Likewise, as the Budget chair, he was instrumental in helping us fund
border security and law enforcement. He was a big part of helping us
implement the Trump agenda, and that was so appropriate. Lindsey was
really--you know, as they say in sports, he was a triple threat. He was
a triple threat. He was a force in our Republican caucus, and he could
work with the Democrats.
Of course, he had a tremendous relationship with President Trump, and
they truly cared about each other. They were real friends. They worked
together, but they truly were friends.
We will miss all of that.
As the former chairman and the senior member of the Senate Judiciary
Committee, Senator Graham shaped the Federal judiciary. Think of how
impactful that has been from the Supreme Court down to the district
courts. He played a central role in the confirmations of Supreme Court
Justices, including Justices Alito, Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and Barrett,
while also helping to oversee a massive conservative shift in the
Federal judiciary.
I think the time that, on the Judiciary Committee, he really said
what he thought, what he felt in his heart about Justice Kavanaugh was
perhaps, if not his finest moment, one of his truly finest moments
where he truly stood up and said what he felt was right on the national
stage and made an incredible difference, a lasting and important,
incredible difference. And it wasn't rehearsed; it was just Lindsey
spontaneously being Lindsey, saying what was in his heart. There is
that old saying: Speak from your gut and your heart. Boy, did he, and
it made a huge difference. That was vintage Lindsey Graham.
His leadership on defense, judiciary, and budget issues will be felt
for years to come.
But for all his accomplishments in the Senate and around the globe,
Senator Graham was most proud of his family. He was a loyal and loving
brother and uncle who once said of his sister:
Of all the things that have happened in my life, her
turning out so well is the highlight of it by far.
It is only fitting that his sister Darline will serve in his place.
We extend her a warm welcome to the Senate like Senator Graham did with
so many of us.
It is almost as if Lindsey and President Trump had one more call
after the call that night where they talked. Lindsey had gotten back
from Ukraine, and the President called him or he called the President.
They talked on the phone, and it was shortly after that that Lindsey
had his heart attack and died.
But it is almost like they had one more call--one more call--where
Lindsey was able to call President Trump again or President Trump was
able to call Lindsey and they talked about, you know, who should
replace Lindsey during that period before the election when the people
of South Carolina will elect their next Senator to replace Lindsey, and
they decided on Darline.
And how fitting. How appropriate. So big thanks to President Trump
for recommending to Governor McMaster that he appoint Darline. We are
so pleased to have her here, and it is so fitting and appropriate.
My wife Mikey and I are praying for Lindsey and for his whole family.
I have to say that my wife Mikey was always a big Lindsey fan. One
time, we are at dinner or something, and she just tells Lindsey how
much I like and respect Lindsey.
I said to her: Why did you do that?
She goes: Well, because you do. You really like him. You respect him.
So I just said: Yes, I know I do, but he is my buddy. You are not
supposed to tell your buddy that; they are just supposed to know it.
But it is true. I think we all did, both sides of the aisle.
We will miss him incredibly. The country, the State of South Carolina
will miss him. Our country will miss Lindsey Graham and his incredible
service.
May God bless Lindsey and his entire family.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic whip.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from North Dakota for
those kind words about our mutual friend. We are both going to miss
him.
I have given a tribute to him today in the committee and partially on
the floor, but it is still hard to imagine the Senate without Lindsey.
(The remarks of Mr. DURBIN pertaining to the introduction of S. 4979
are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills
and Joint Resolutions.'')
Mr. DURBIN. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to enter into a
colloquy with the Senator from North Carolina Senator Tillis.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Bipartisan Safer Communities Act
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, 4 years ago, Congress passed our
legislative response to one of the deadliest school shootings in
American history. It happened in Uvalde, TX, at Robb Elementary School.
Nineteen innocent children and two adults--teachers--lost their lives
that day.
It was a devastating--a devastating--occurrence. Unfortunately, it
was not
[[Page S3920]]
an isolated event. Americans around the country, though, joined in the
suffering of these families' experience as they mourned the loss of
their loved ones.
Flags at Federal buildings and military installations were lowered to
halfstaff. We all knew we wanted to do whatever we could do to prevent
something like this from happening again if there was anything that we
could actually do legislatively.
The much harder question was, What would that look like?
In the days that followed, we heard from many Americans--Texans,
North Carolinians, and folks all around the country--saying that no
parent should ever have to send their child to school wondering will
that child be safe, and no child should have to go to school wondering
if they were going to be a victim of a mass shooting.
We knew that whatever we did, it would not bring back those teachers
and innocent children from the act of pure evil that unfolded on May
24, 2022. But we knew that--Senator Tillis, Senator Sinema, Senator
Murphy, and I took on the task of trying to come up with a bill that
would actually make a difference, that would save lives.
But we knew we had to do it consistent with the Second Amendment to
the U.S. Constitution, but we felt like we could make some progress and
save lives.
As negotiations continued, there was pressure mounting from some
corners of this Chamber to do things that maybe sounded pretty good,
but they wouldn't actually change the results or maybe they would be
unconstitutional in depriving law-abiding citizens of their Second
Amendment rights.
During the meetings that we had together, I think we concluded that
if we actually wanted to be successful in doing something that would
make a difference and save lives, that we couldn't just try to do
something that perhaps was a good press release or might make the
evening news; we actually had to do something that would be meaningful
and that would result in saving lives.
I have long been a champion of Second Amendment rights. That is
probably no surprise. Texans believe in the Second Amendment. But some
of these proposals, obviously, were unacceptable to me, personally, but
they, as I said, failed to address the problems that we have seen in
these school shootings in a way that would be meaningful.
The best solution, in my view, was that we needed to find some way to
come to grips with the mental health crisis in our country and
particularly that affecting young people and, in this case, in the wake
of COVID and the isolation many of these young people had.
But we also knew that we needed to be narrow and specifically tailor
policy changes that would save those lives. So we worked together and
passed a bill called the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which passed
the Senate on June 23 and was signed into law June 25 of 2022, 32 days
after the shooting.
Now, the Senate does not ordinarily operate at that sort of speed, I
can assure you, as we all know, but we wrote this law carefully and
deliberately to ensure no law-abiding citizen's Second Amendment rights
would be impaired.
To be plain, if you didn't suffer from a mental illness or you
weren't a criminal, you would not be affected by this law. That was
true then, and it is true today.
What this bill did do is made a historic investment in mental health
and school safety and commonsense measures to prevent dangerous
individuals from being a harm to themselves and others.
Texas, like all the States, has received significant amounts of
money; in the case of Texas, hundreds of millions of dollars from this
law--more than $312 million, to date, to strengthen our mental health
care and school hardening--to make it more difficult for violent
individuals to attack soft targets like schools typically have been but
no more.
Universities use these resources to partner with local school
districts to provide training for mental health professionals to
support students, and school districts have used these resources to
upgrade their security systems, to implement threat alert systems, and
improve emergency response plans.
I saw some of these firsthand when I visited R.L. Paschal High School
in Fort Worth, which received more than $350,000 for specialized
emergency radios and safety upgrades.
The BSCA, as it is called, also expanded certified community
behavioral health clinics around the country, which has allowed mental
health clinics to expand their coverage to include not only mental
health but substance abuse disorders.
We have all come to be aware of the fact that we simply have not
treated or provided the resources for people suffering from mental
health challenges that are necessary to help them not only get better
but prevent them from descending into self-harm or harm to others.
There are now more than 500 community-based mental health centers
operating in 46 States, and additional States have added to the CCBHC
Demonstration Program recently announced by the Health and Human
Services Secretary, Secretary Kennedy, that was directly linked to this
law that we passed 4 years ago.
Now, of course, there has been a lot of misunderstanding living in
the world we live in with social media and officeholders and would-be
officeholders running in political campaigns. There is a lot of
misunderstanding about what this law did and what it did not do.
For example, some have described this bill as a gun control law,
which it is not. So, today, together with my colleague--our colleague--
Senator Tillis of North Carolina, who is a great partner in this
legislation, we want to address some of the widespread misconceptions
about the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act and just set the record
straight.
One of the things I heard most in the recent campaign I ran in was
that we had passed a red flag law which would make it possible for an
aggrieved partner or spouse or family member or maybe even a neighbor
to basically turn in somebody and have their firearms confiscated
without due process of law.
We decided upfront that although some States did have red flag laws,
that No. 1, it was important that there be appropriate due process
requirements before they can access any of the resources in this law
and, secondly, that there not be a national red flag law--leave this up
to the States.
The truth is, the BSCA actually makes it harder to implement red flag
laws because you can't do so and access this money unless you enhance
the due process protections that are necessary to protect what is a
constitutional right.
Our legislation created this due process framework that I know you
will hear more about from Senator Tillis, but I knew that my State,
Texas, would never pass a State red flag law, and the last thing I was
going to do was to support or embrace a red flag law, national law,
that would preempt Texas law. So we wanted to make sure that the
funding that was available was available for crisis intervention
programs, veterans courts, mental health courts--just to use a couple
of examples--that did not have those red flag laws while making sure
those States that did could not gain access to this money unless they
provided an enhanced due process procedure.
So it is false to argue that the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act
created an incentive for more States to pass new red flag laws, and the
statistics bear it out.
Only 4 percent of the total money appropriated was obligated to red
flag-related activities--4 percent--in States with existing red flag
laws, and those States now had to comply with the law so a stricter due
process standard applied.
The vast majority of BSCA funds have gone, instead, to State mental
health programs, veterans courts, as I mentioned, crisis intervention,
school safety measures. The only States to implement a new red flag law
were two States that already had begun the process to pass one before
the BSCA passed.
So the BSCA--Bipartisan Safer Communities Act--did not cause or leave
any State to pass new red flag laws. What we did is made it harder for
those laws to be abused in those States that had them by providing for
this enhanced level of due process protection of this Second Amendment
constitutional right.
[[Page S3921]]
Another misconception I heard on the campaign trail or saw on social
media was that we somehow created a mandatory waiting period before
somebody could access a firearm if they were going into a store to
purchase it for those under 21. Once again, this is false.
Many individuals who create acts of violence like school shootings
have a history of violence, are known to local law enforcement, and are
essentially ticking timebombs. That is what happened in Uvalde, TX, 4
years ago. The Uvalde shooter was a deeply troubled young man known by
everybody in the neighborhood to be trouble, and there were warning
signs that, I think, demonstrated the fact that he was not only a
potential danger to himself but also others.
He was isolated, a bully. He self-harmed. He had a history of
fighting, threatening fellow students, and abusing animals. He bought
weapons and ammunition within days of turning 18 because the juvenile
records in Texas were not uploaded into the National Instant Criminal
Background Check System like they are for adults.
So there was virtually no possibility of any record of this
potentially derogatory or disqualifying information that would have
been available at the time of his purchase.
If a person's record includes disqualifying criminal convictions or
mental health adjudication, it shouldn't matter whether it occurred a
day before their 18th birthday. And what the Bipartisan Safer
Communities Act allowed law enforcement officials to do was go back and
look at those juvenile records. That information must now be available
on the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. The BSCA
incentivizes States to upload these juvenile records, but it places a
strict time limit on how long the review process can take place. If a
determination is not made in that window, the purchase proceeds.
Interestingly, far less than 1 percent of firearms background checks
are affected by the checks for under 21-year-old buyers that this bill
deals with, but yet we know that it has made a real difference.
There was the 18-year-old attempting to purchase a long gun in
Nebraska who as a minor made terroristic threats and was placed in a
mental institution, or the 20-year-old drug dealer with a juvenile
felony adjudication who attempted to purchase a long gun in Arizona.
These individuals would have never been discovered before the
Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.
States agree with its efficacy, including Texas, which passed the law
soon after the BSCA passed to ensure that juvenile mental health
records would be available to the National Instant Criminal Background
Check System.
This leads me to another important provision in the BSCA, which gives
the Department of Justice tools to prosecute individuals for straw
purchases. So, for example, if a drug dealer knows that his or her
criminal conviction would disqualify them from purchasing a firearm
legally, they can't get their boyfriend or girlfriend to buy it for
them without violating the law. Straw purchases are the primary way
that criminals and illegal aliens arm themselves, and the Trump
administration has used these new criminal provisions enacted in the
BSCA to target cartel members.
Ryan Routh, who made an attempt against President Trump's life at
Trump International golf course in September of 2024 acquired the gun
via a straw purchase because his prior criminal record would have
prevented him from buying it legally.
Before BSCA, the only penalty a criminal faced for a straw purchase
was lying on their firearms transaction, a minor offense which many
prosecutors would not bother to pursue.
The BSCA also created a new firearms trafficking law. Since drug
cartel members can't legally purchase firearms, they rely on firearms
traffickers to arm them and carry out their violence.
Now because of this law, the Department of Justice has a tool to
combat cartel violence and prosecute individuals who engage in firearms
trafficking. Indeed, the Department of Justice has convicted 459
criminals under the straw purchasing and firearms trafficking laws--
459--while another 716 violent criminals are currently facing charges
under this law.
So we all want our communities to be safe, but we also want to make
sure that we respect the rights of law-abiding citizens; and no law we
would pass restricting the rights of law-abiding citizens, were we to
do so, would make a difference. No law-abiding citizen is a threat to
their community.
But this is one of the reasons why I was a vocal critic of President
Biden's open border policies which allowed millions of people to come
into the country, including some criminals and cartel members. It is
the reason why I opposed the ``defund the police'' movement that left a
wave of unchecked violence and crime in America's blue cities.
And that is why working together with Senator Tillis, Senator Sinema,
and Senator Murphy, we made sure we passed a law which actually would
invest in mental health resources to identify individuals who were
suffering before they became a danger to themselves or others.
We literally made the single largest investment when we passed this
law 4 years ago of community-based mental healthcare and made our
schools safer for all of our children so they can focus on why they are
in school in the first place: to learn.
And parents don't have to worry at home about is my son or my
daughter going to be safe, all the while protecting the Second
Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens.
So as I reflect back on my time here in the U.S. Senate, there are a
few legislative accomplishments I have made that have helped the people
of Texas and our country at large--at least I hope that is the case--
but out of all of these, the BSCA was one of the most critical in
tangibly making the country safer for families and children.
Parents may not know when they interact with security systems at the
entrance of their child's preschool that they are actually benefitting
from this law, but the BSCA has made a difference, and it will continue
to do so.
So I am proud, working together with Senator Tillis and Senator
Sinema and Senator Murphy, that we were able to accomplish this even in
the face of organized opposition.
What I did learn--and maybe it shouldn't have been a surprise to me--
is that there are cottage industries in Washington, DC, that spread
misinformation about legislation that is actually challenging to pass
because it does involve something like a constitutional right--the
Second Amendment--but strictly they do it for the purposes of raising
money from their membership for using in political campaigns.
But the one reason we are here in the Senate, the one reason I am
proud to be here is because we are willing to take on some of these
hard, complex issues on occasion and to try to come up with tangible
results that benefit our constituents and all the American people.
So I yield to Senator Tillis.
Mr. TILLIS. Senator Cornyn, I would describe as probably the ultimate
statesman and gentleman here in the Senate. I am not.
And so Senator Cornyn talked about all the merits of the bill, and we
stand by them. I should also say he gets special credit for a lot of
those provisions because they are in there because of his
participation.
I have long said that I don't hold grudges, but I settle scores. And
today is a good day to settle a score on another anniversary of the
Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.
We had a lot of people, actually organizations I have been a member
of in the past, spread a lot of false information about this bill. They
said it was going to be a red flag bill.
Well, the fact of the matter is, there is funding in this bill for
red flag, for States that have implemented red flag laws. Here is the
little secret: not even Republican red flag States satisfy our rigorous
standards for due process, which is why they haven't applied for any
funding. They wouldn't qualify for it unless they changed their plans.
So this didn't cause a wave of red State laws to be implemented.
Quite the contrary, it provided resources in behavioral health and
veterans courts and drug courts and family courts to help people that
may be in crisis ahead of them.
Those same people who were saying: Send money now, support us because
[[Page S3922]]
we are defending your Second Amendment right. I should mention as
speaker of the house, we expanded concealed carry rights of North
Carolina at levels that people couldn't imagine.
I am a concealed carry permittee. I have more than one gun, but I am
a responsible gun owner who also finished the concealed carry class and
also hunter safety. And I think we all need to be responsible gun
owners.
But at the end of the day, you have got to decide whether or not a
kid going into a gun store on their 18th birthday, if that is their day
to buy a gun.
So let's talk a little bit about what this bill really does versus
what the mercenaries were trying to do to raise money and kill this
bill.
All we are saying--show of hands, do we have any pages that are 18
years old? OK. Younger or older? Younger, OK.
So these kids right now, whatever--sorry, these young adults right
now, whatever they are doing, if they have got a committal, a
behavioral health committal, if they assaulted a police officer, shot
at one, got prosecuted for it when they were 16\1/2\ years old or 17
years old, on their 18th birthday, it is like that device in--what was
it--``Men in Black,'' where you erase that. Can you imagine that?
If you were 18 years old on your birthday and you had been convicted
of a crime or had a serious legal entanglement, when you go to the NICS
system, it was as if you were a day old. Does anybody think that really
makes sense, that the crime you committed a couple of months, let's say
a month, 60 days, 90 days earlier, would have not been relevant? That
is absurd.
Of course if you are under 21, we need to have some insight into what
your life looked like when you were 16 or 17 years old. That is what
the enhanced background check was, and yet some of these gun advocacy
organizations thought that was horrible. It was going to lead to a mass
confiscation of guns. It was a backdoor, I think. It was a backdoor
into just taking all of our guns away.
It was going to devastate the Second Amendment protections of our
Constitution. I heard them all saying it, saying some of it. Let me
tell you what actually happened. All we did was say: If you are under
21, we are going to try and find out as much as we need to know about
you for your safety and for the safety of your community.
So all we did was say: We are going to go to local law enforcement.
We are going to try and get information out there and encourage States
to provide the information to our national center for clearing gun
purchases in West Virginia sooner so that those who do not have a bad
record can get their gun purchased sooner so that we can in a matter of
3 to 10 days get this done.
All the people that were opposed to this bill said that we were not
going to get any approvals done, that even the good law-abiding over
21s were going to get swept into this somehow.
Well, let me tell you what has happened since June of this year. The
NICS system is doing just fine. About 4,000 people who were going to be
denied based on the law have been denied.
So look at these numbers again. Talking about mass confiscation, how
disruptive this was, how nobody was going to be able to get guns,
right? That is what all the people said: Send money, we are defending
your Second Amendment right here in Washington.
Almost 551,000 transactions for purchasing guns have been processed
as of June of this year. About 3,800 of them were denied for reasons
that existed before we ever passed this law. What we have done though
is found some 1,630 young people that that was not their day to buy a
gun.
That was--I could go through a long list. I could talk about people
being convicted of assaulting a police officer. I could talk about
people who had a long gun after they had been convicted of a crime in
their car. I could talk about people who accidentally in North Carolina
shot their girlfriend a year before and all of a sudden--at 17 and
wanted to get a gun.
Does anybody in their right mind think that is a good day for that
kid to get a gun?
I am not talking about a 38-year-old person going in. I am talking
about an 18-year-old. I am talking about a 19-year-old. I am talking
about a 20-year-old. All we did was say: Guys, let's make sure that
this is a safe decision for the child and for the community. That is
what this bill did, and that is why this bill has withstood the test of
time and not a single--not one scintilla--and I would defy anybody who
was against this bill to find one of the things that they predicted and
guaranteed would happen have actually occurred.
What has happened is we may have saved 1,600 people who may have been
buying that gun to hurt themselves, maybe to hurt their community--
maybe not. But what we know is that day was not the day that we should
allow them to leave that gun store with a weapon for their safety and
the safety of the community.
This is Congress at its best. It is looking at the people that you
generally support--and Senator Cornyn was first among them--and the gun
rights community and saying: Guys, I can't take the top-line arguments
against this because you all know it is not really true. It is this
black-and-white world that we live in here, and it requires the very
seldom impactful language like, and legislation like, the Communities
Act ever get done because people get afraid of the noise and they back
into their corners.
And I want to give Senator Cornyn an enormous amount of credit for
stepping up and doing what he did to make Texas safer, make the country
safer, and make these people and their loved ones and their neighbors
in the community safer.
The last thing I will leave you with is, to the States that do have
red flag laws--including, I believe, the State of the Presiding
Officer--let's get those red flag laws consistent with due process and
show respect to gun owners because I am not aware of any red flag law,
even in red States, that come close to the sorts of protections that we
also put into this bill.
So let's give them an incentive to get it right. Let's make sure that
every law-abiding citizen who wants to have a gun can--like me and like
Senator Cornyn and like so many other people--but let's be smart about
it.
And let's make sure that we continue this trend of being sure that
when a person applies for a weapon, that they can safely own it, they
are going to be safe for themselves and their community, and stop this
nonsense of fearing any sort of positive change because of political
repercussions.
This bill is one of the best bills that I had the privilege to work
on. And the thing that is amazing about this bill is, it went from
concept to implementation in fewer than 6 weeks. That is what happens
when Congress gets together, they set aside their partisan differences,
they refuse to listen to the false information trying to kill a bill,
and they do something good for their State and their country. That is
exactly--on this anniversary of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act--
what we accomplished.
I want to thank Senator Cornyn for his partnership. It was not an
easy bill. It was a lot of work, but we got it done. I thank Senator
Murphy, and I should have mentioned Senator Gillibrand--or not
Gillibrand--wrong Kirsten--Senator Sinema for working together.
I mean, we had people across the political spectrum, folks. Chris
Murphy, whom I consider a friend and colleague, about as liberal as
anybody in this Chamber--and I think he would admit that. And we have
got John Cornyn, who is one of the most conservative. And then you have
got me and Sinema probably somewhere in the middle.
We got together, and we got this done. And there are more people
safe, and I believe there are people alive today that may not have been
if this bill hadn't passed.
So, Senator Cornyn, I appreciate the work that you did on this bill.
I believe we have got something that we should be proud of. And I also
believe, Senator Cornyn, that the straw purchases, the gun trafficking,
all the other things that we didn't spend a lot of time on--we can come
down here and do a colloquy and talk about more and more of the
positive aspects of this bill. And I appreciate your leadership in
moving it.
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I just wanted to say there is one thing
that Senator Tillis said that I disagree with, and that is that he said
he is not a statesman. He is. And it took a lot of
[[Page S3923]]
political courage to do something that we knew we were buying trouble
because we knew that this can be such an emotional issue and so easy to
mislead people about what the facts are, that we knew that there would
be a political price to be paid in order to take on this challenge.
But one of the things that I think, as we are talking about the harm
of a young person who is suffering from mental illness or with a
criminal record, a juvenile record of that--I am sure you are aware of
this, but I just happened to double-check. The Pew Poll says that 62
percent of the gun deaths in America are suicide.
These are people--perhaps a disturbed young person--
Mr. TILLIS. Purchased later.
Mr. CORNYN.--suffering mental problems who got--who actually then
used that gun to kill themselves or harm themselves.
Has that been your--
Mr. TILLIS. That is exactly right.
Mr. CORNYN.--your experience?
Mr. TILLIS. You take a look at the--I spend a lot of time and focus
on behavioral health, Senator Cornyn, and the data is compelling.
There is no question in my mind--just the sheer number here--there is
no question in my mind that we saved the life of somebody who is buying
a gun for that purpose. There is no doubt in my mind the numbers
stipulate that.
Mr. CORNYN. And one of the things that I learned back, years ago,
when I had a protective detail and I was the whip, is my Capital Police
officer said there is this phenomenon, which I never fully appreciated
before. If you think about it, some of these mass shootings are
actually an act of suicide themselves because these shooters go into
these situations, knowing--or likely knowing--that they will never make
their way out of it. But they don't have the courage to take their own
life. They need to take other people down with them, and there is a
phenomenon called death by cop, where they know that by engaging a law
enforcement officer, that they ultimately will be killed of necessity
by the law enforcement officer to prevent causing more harm.
But I want to ask just one last question. Are you aware, has anybody
contacted your office, or have you read anything in the press or seen
anything on broadcast media that would indicate that a single law-
abiding American has been denied access to their Second Amendment
rights because of this law?
Mr. TILLIS. No, quite the contrary. That is why I am saying--look, I
love saying I told you so, and I believed that that was going to be the
case here.
But, Senator Cornyn, let me just say it for anybody--for the 20
people watching on C-SPAN--and, hopefully, some will cover our
statements--I defy anybody--anyone--who opposed this bill, who scored
it, who threatened Members to vote against it, I defy them to come to
my office and find one example of what they were telling people to
oppose this bill that actually came to pass--one.
Here it is: Public challenge. Guys, you who so--you were out there.
You were emailing. You were raising money. You were saying the world is
going to end, guns are going to be confiscated, that straw purchases
were going to destroy--you know, that we weren't going after
trafficking, that we were going after law-abiding officers, and their
licenses were going to be--all these things, all this noise.
I will dedicate an hour to somebody who wants to come into my office
and prove to me that one--one--negative behavior by any State or local
government or Federal Government has occurred. This is what happened,
folks.
But you want to come to my office, I will guarantee you, you refer to
this C-SPAN segment and you want to come to my office and prove that
something bad happened, I will take that. My guess is, I will get that
hour back, and that is what I mean.
You know, at some point on these tough issues, we keep kicking the
can down the road because we let people off the hook for saying things
that are patently untrue and then not hold them to account a year or
two later. Well, I am here to tell you: I am here for the next 173 days
before I retire. Anybody who wants to come in and prove one bad outcome
from this bill, give me a call.
And, Senator Cornyn, again, you and I are both--we are both here for
another 173 days. We got--and I say that not because I am counting the
days to leave, but I am counting the days that we have to make an
impact. And I hope I can continue to work with you on this and other
bills to even make it better.
We are, unabashedly, unapologetically, pro-Second Amendment
Republicans. But we are smart about it, and we have the courage to step
up when we see a change can be made that will keep us true to those
values but also keep our communities safer. And I appreciate your
leadership on this.
Mr. CORNYN. As I do yours.
We yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
Remembering Lindsey Graham
Mr. CASSIDY. Mr. President, I rise, as so many others have, to give
tribute to Senator Lindsey Graham.
Lindsey was effective as a Senator, in large part, because he was so
well-liked by colleagues and because he liked them in return.
He was affable, always willing to work with others, regardless of how
different backgrounds, beliefs, and positions were. He just focused on
getting things done and had the courage to take on issues that others
would not.
We collaborated on something called Graham-Cassidy, a bill which
would have replaced Obamacare with coverage for everyone--literally
everyone--but at a lower cost than the Affordable Care Act. I always
chuckle when I say the Affordable Care Act.
And we were a good team because we complemented each other. I was a
doctor, always thinking about healthcare. He was the politician's
politician.
He told me: Bill, you are good at policy, but you are a terrible
politician.
And I would say that many people knew exactly what he was talking
about. At one point, I was talking to him about healthcare. He said:
Oh, Bill, don't talk to me about policy. It gives me headaches. But he
said he would fight to get it passed. We came up short but not because
he did not and I did not fight.
Once he said: I am going to go on ``FOX Morning.'' If I go on ``FOX
Morning,'' I know the President is watching. And if the President is
watching the ``FOX Morning'' show and I say we should be fighting to
replace Obamacare, it will get the President engaged.
He just knew how to find that audience that was important. He knew
how to speak to them. He had a great sense of humor, and, again, he
knew how to get things done.
Ultimately, that is why somebody comes to Washington. Some people
come to Washington to be a Senator. Others come to Washington to do
something as a Senator. Lindsey was someone who came to Washington to
do something as a Senator.
I speak for myself, but I echo what colleagues have said. Lindsey
Graham shall be missed.
Healthcare
Mr. President, we have got to do something about healthcare. Now, I
am a physician. You might think I--of course, Bill cares about it. I
can tell you who cares about it is the American people.
I was with an Uber driver last night: What do you think--you know, if
you were the President, Uber driver, what would you be talking about
right now?
She said: I can't afford things. I can't afford my gas. I can't
afford my groceries, my housing. I can't afford my healthcare.
Now, that has been echoed.
And, in fact, what we are seeing is that the inability to afford
healthcare is impacting the ability of small businesses to provide
health insurance for their employees. The employer-based health
insurance system is the most dominant form of providing health
insurance for those less than 65, and it is crumbling. The percentage
of working-age adults getting health coverage from a job has decreased
from 67 percent--oh, about 25 years ago--to about 60 percent now. And
the reason why is that premiums are going up so much, particularly for
those 62 percent of Americans who get their insurance from a small
business.
There is a recent article in STAT which, based upon Federal
Government information, if you look at inflation since about 1985,
premiums should have
[[Page S3924]]
risen about 176 percent. But they have actually risen over 1,000--
almost 1,100--percent higher than they should have. To put it this way,
if they should have risen 176 percent, they have actually risen about
1,100 percent. These are premiums.
Now, by the way, these premiums continue to rise after the passage of
the Affordable Care Act. Indeed, the rise became higher, faster after
the passage of the Affordable Care Act.
And so, if you are a small business, you are trying to make ends
meet. Businesses contribute to the health insurance of their employees.
Typically, they may employ--it depends upon the business, but they may
give, oh, 100 percent. They may give 80 percent. They may give 60
percent. But whatever percent that the small business is contributing
to their employees is going up.
The other thing to recognize is that, when it begins to rise too
much, then the employer pays less and less for the employees' health
insurance. This can be manifested in a couple ways. Instead of paying
80 percent of the cost of the policy, they may pay only 60 percent. Or
the small business may decide to get a less expensive policy, in which
case they increase the deductible.
Now, the deductible is what we pay out of pocket before the insurance
kicks in. That is the problem.
And so, if you look at, since about 2000, the amount of deductible at
a big business is about $1,700. At a small business, for a single
worker, among workers with a deductible, it is now about $2,600.
So before the insurance begins to work for the employee, they have to
come up with, on average, $2,600 to pay before the insurance kicks in.
Now, it may be something like a routine visit, which is covered. They
may have preventive care covered, like a mammogram or a screening
colonoscopy. But, typically, they have got to put up $2,600, on
average, if they go to the emergency room after a car wreck, and only
then does the insurance begin to kick in.
Now, why is that important? Because most families have less than $500
of cash in order to pay for their healthcare.
In previous speeches, I have talked about how people are putting
their healthcare expenditures on their credit card. And that credit
card debt factors into 60 percent of household bankruptcies. So they
have a $3,000 deductible, and they don't have the money in their bank
account. Their child gets sick, and they bring them to the emergency
room. They don't have the $3,000. So they put it on the credit card,
and that credit card debt mounts.
Indeed, if you look at the percent of income that Americans are now
paying upon credit card interest, which means that they are carrying a
balance, it has risen from about 1 percent to 3.2 percent. So 3.2
percent of their income is going to pay for interest on credit cards.
This shows that they are rolling these big credit card balances
forward. So with credit card balances not paid, but being the minimal
amount being paid, they are up to $10,000.
Much of this relates back to: How do you pay for healthcare? I don't
have the money in my account. So I am going to use my credit card in
order to pay for these large deductibles.
Well, I have got a way to address that, Mr. President. We call it the
MVP Act. Under our plan, we would give an advance, an income tax
credit, to the family--on average, for a family of four, about $2,000--
that would go into an account that they use to pay for their benefits.
By the way, this is paid for. This is paid for.
But they would prefund a health savings account.
Now, we don't give it to the insurance company because, if you give
the money to the insurance company to subsidize the premiums, the
insurance company takes 20 percent of it for overhead and for profit.
You give it to the individual or family, and they are going to use 100
percent of it for the healthcare that they need.
Now, we have coupled that. So it is money in your pocket. We couple
that by adding value, price transparency, so that the family knows the
price they pay before they go in for the service. That could be
powerful.
I was up here in DC once. Actually, I remember we were having a
crawfish boil. Every year, Louisiana people have a crawfish boil. And
there was a woman who saw me on the street. She stopped me.
She said: Hey, Dr. Cassidy.
And I said: Yes.
She said: I am from Texas, but I saw that you gave a speech about
price transparency, and that if I paid cash, it would be cheaper than
if I went through my insurance. So the doctor ordered an MRI on my
son's shoulder, and they told me it was going to cost $2,000. Well, my
deductible was whatever it was--say a thousand dollars. So I said: How
much, if I pay you cash? They said: Well, if you pay us cash, it is
only $600.
In this case, paying cash was cheaper than paying her deductible.
So if you know, if you have price transparency, if you say, ``Wait a
second; I am going to have at least a thousand dollars out of pocket
because of my deductible, but if I paid cash right now and don't go
through my insurance, it only cost me $600,'' you are going to bring
value to the patient.
In this transaction, under the MVP plan, there would have been money
placed into her health savings account. She could have used--in this
case, she did it on her own--price transparency to find out the price.
So there is money and value for the patient.
We take the power away from the middleman, the power away from the
insurance company to approve or disapprove of the care that the patient
knows that she needs; and, instead, we would give the money directly to
her, with the tools of price transparency to bring value to the
patient.
Now, we are making steps on this. Right now in the HELP Committee--
the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee--of which I am the
chair, we are working on price transparency legislation. We hope to get
that passed in the next 2 weeks out of Committee, and we hope this
passes on the floor of the Senate. This is how we bring value to the
patient, by bringing the power of price transparency, as she chooses
what healthcare and where to get her healthcare.
Now, we can get this done. Whenever there is a big idea like this,
how do we actually help the American people with affordability? How do
we actually put money in their pocket and couple it with tools that
would give them the power of price transparency, in order to bring
money in their pocket and value for the patient?
People say: Oh, that is too big. We can't get that done--no way.
But, folks, we have actually achieved a lot on healthcare in the last
few years. The No Surprises Act blocks about a million surprise medical
bills per month for the American people. A PBM reform bill, which was
signed into law by President Trump a few months ago but that was
negotiated by Congress--and it was tough, but we actually got it so
that the value to the patient in terms of lower drug prices, if you
will, cutting out or restricting activities of the insurance company in
the middle--we got that through. The administration is working on
TrumpRx, which allows patients to buy drugs without hidden costs.
So if we are going to make healthcare affordable to the American
people, we have to build on that record, and we have to work together.
So my challenge to the Senate, to the House, and to the President:
Let us come together. Let us get things done. Let us work for the
American people.
Ask any Uber driver, ask our constituents: What is the biggest issue
right now?
And they will say: Affording life.
Affording life means to be able to afford healthcare.
And, Mr. President, with the MVP health agenda, we help our
constituents afford healthcare.
With that, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Curtis). The majority leader.
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