[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 2]
[Senate]
[Pages 2422-2423]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             THE SEQUESTER

  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I am not sure where the Obama 
administration is getting all of its talking points on the sequester, 
but the President might want to consider hiring a fact checker.
  Even before the sequester took effect, Education Secretary Arne 
Duncan declared that schoolteachers were getting pink slips. A few days 
later he had to walk those comments back. He said he was referring to a 
single school in West Virginia. But when the Washington Post contacted 
the superintendent of that school, he said not one teacher had gotten a 
pink slip because of the sequester.
  Then President Obama suggested that all of the people who keep the 
Capitol clean would be suffering a pay cut. But that wasn't true 
either, according to Capitol Superintendent Carlos Elias.
  We have been repeatedly told that the sequester would trigger drastic 
layoffs of Federal workers. Yet on Monday alone the Federal Government 
posted literally hundreds of job advertisements.
  Finally, just yesterday, when asked to provide evidence for the claim 
that 70,000 children would be denied access to Head Start because of 
the sequester, the White House had no details. While the President has 
been out there playing Chicken Little, Members of Congress have been 
waiting for the White House to send over its budget.

[[Page 2423]]

  The law requires the President to transmit a budget by February 4, 
and we have been now advised his budget will not be forthcoming until 
March 25. Ironically, that will actually be after the House and the 
Senate have taken up our own budget, and we will have no input from the 
President on his proposal.
  A few weeks ago I said a second term offers the President a second 
chance. I still remain hopeful that President Obama will eventually be 
persuaded to adopt a serious approach for long-term deficit reduction 
and long-term economic growth.
  One of the great tragedies in America today is the fact that our 
economy is growing so slowly that unemployment rates remain 
unacceptably high--roughly around 8 percent. That is only after many 
people have simply given up looking for work. Now more than 20 million 
people are either out of work or they are working part time when they 
would prefer to work full time. But that is not going to happen until 
we get the economy growing again--and that is not going to happen until 
we get our hands around our long-term deficit and economic growth.
  I realize the President and Democrats want to take the House of 
Representatives back in 2014. The President probably remembers the 
Halcyon days of 2009 and 2010 when his party controlled the White 
House, the Senate, and the House. That got us ObamaCare, a $1 trillion 
stimulus, and a whole lot more debt, and the Dodd-Frank law--which was 
targeted at Wall Street but which hit Main Street, including a lot of 
our community bankers.
  There is a time for campaigning and there is a time for governing. 
But the 2012 election occurred 17 weeks ago and the 2014 election will 
not occur for another 20 months. Now is the time for governing, not for 
delivering more partisan stump speeches. In order to govern, the Senate 
needs to pass a budget, something this Chamber has not done for more 
than 1,400 days. Over that same period our gross national debt has 
grown by $5.5 trillion and we have experienced the weakest economic 
recovery since the Great Depression. Since the official end of the 
recession in June of 2009, the median household income in America has 
fallen by more than $2,400. Meanwhile, since the President took office 
the cost of family health insurance has increased by $2,300. So not 
only has household income for most Americans--the median household 
income, that is--dropped by $2,400, they are seeing an additional 
burden of $2,300 because of ObamaCare.
  The bottom line is the American people are tired of the ``Chicken 
Little'' stories and they are tired of the fear mongering. They look at 
what is happening in Washington--I know my constituents in Texas do--
and they almost want to turn their eyes in another direction to avert 
their gaze because they understand that Washington is not serving their 
interests. If President Obama wants real change, it is time for him to 
get behind real tax reform and real reform of Social Security and 
Medicare, something his own bipartisan fiscal commission--Simpson-
Bowles--recommended.
  After all, the American people did not send us here to kick and 
scream over a 2.4-percent budget cut. They sent us here to make some 
hard decisions to ensure long-term economic health and economic 
prosperity and it is time for the President as the leader of our 
country and the leader of the free world to take that message to heart.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Baldwin). The Senator from Kentucky is 
recognized.

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