[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 16906-16916]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           TRADE ACT OF 2015

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the 
Senate will resume consideration of the House message to accompany H.R. 
1314, which the clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       House message to accompany H.R. 1314, an act to amend the 
     Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide for a right to an 
     administrative appeal relating to adverse determinations of 
     tax-exempt status of certain organizations.

  Pending:

       McConnell motion to concur in the amendment of the House of 
     Representatives to the amendment of the Senate to the bill.
       McConnell motion to concur in the amendment of the House of 
     Representatives to the amendment of the Senate to the bill, 
     with McConnell amendment No. 2750, to change the enactment 
     date.
       McConnell amendment No. 2751 (to amendment No. 2750), of a 
     perfecting nature.
       McConnell motion to refer the amendment of the House of 
     Representatives to the amendment of the Senate to the bill, 
     to the Committee on Finance, with instructions, McConnell 
     amendment No. 2752, to change the enactment date.
       McConnell amendment No. 2753 (to (the instructions) 
     amendment No. 2752), of a perfecting nature.
       McConnell amendment No. 2754 (to amendment No. 2753), of a 
     perfecting nature.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the time 
until 1:01 a.m. will be equally divided between the two leaders or 
their designees.
  The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to waive the 
mandatory quorum call with respect to the motion to concur in the House 
message to accompany H.R. 1314.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, earlier this week the White House and 
congressional leadership announced a budget deal that will avert a 
potential shutdown of the Federal Government and prevent a default on 
our country's obligations. This agreement would provide relief to the 
arbitrary sequester caps for 2 years and maintain the full faith and 
credit of the United States by extending the debt limit to March 2017.
  For months we have been calling on both sides to abandon any reckless 
budget cuts and work together to give the American people much needed 
relief from the sequester. I applaud President Obama and the leaders 
from both political parties for crafting a commonsense solution that 
protects the American people and our economic recovery.
  This measure passed the House of Representatives, and now it is our 
turn. This agreement calls for $112 billion in sequester relief, 
providing necessary funding for critical programs on which many 
Americans depend. With this additional funding, dramatic cuts in these 
programs can be avoided.
  Yesterday I spoke about the importance of biomedical research. 
Funding for the National Institutes of Health can lead to medical 
breakthroughs that keep us healthier and save money in the long run. 
One illustration: One American is diagnosed with Alzheimer's every 67 
seconds in America, and $1 out of every $5 spent in the Medicare system 
is spent for those suffering from Alzheimer's and dementia. The numbers 
are growing, the cost is growing, and the research is imperative. If we 
can find a way to delay the onset of Alzheimer's, treat it, cure it, 
for goodness' sake, it not only will spare human suffering, but it will 
save our budget. So is money for medical research well spent? Of 
course. Yet in past years we have shortchanged it in the name of budget 
relief.
  Well, this is a moment where we can keep our promise to the NIH, to 
the CDC, and many other agencies that are responsible for medical 
research. Thanks to bipartisan support--and I especially note the 
Senator from Missouri, Roy Blunt, as well as the Senator from 
Washington, Patty Murray--we are going to see an increase in the Senate 
bill this year for NIH if the Senate number continues, and I hope that 
it does. But it shouldn't come at the expense of other programs, such 
as the Centers for Disease Control, which faces cuts in our version of 
the bill and receives better treatment in the House. We can't be the 
world leader in biomedical research by cutting funding for NIH or CDC.
  We should also restore funding for community health centers and 
substance abuse and mental health programs. As I travel around the 
State of Illinois, our State, like most States, is facing a heroin 
epidemic. We find that the overdoses and deaths associated with heroin 
are now striking a part of our population that they never struck 
before. The prevalence of death from heroin in America in the last 15 
years has changed dramatically, and now most of the victims are White, 
between the ages of 18 and 44. And that means we have to do something 
about it, not only in policing--which is, of course, our 
responsibility--but also when it comes to treatment for those who are

[[Page 16907]]

addicted. We can't cut back in substance abuse and mental health 
programs without paying a heavy price and inviting more human 
suffering.
  We need to ensure that the FDA has the funding to fully implement the 
Food Safety Modernization Act.
  The money in this budget agreement will help us reach these goals and 
many others. We can work together to chip away at the $850 million 
underinvestment in programs that help our veterans, ensuring that those 
who put their lives on the line for America are given the care, the 
respect, and the quality education they deserve.
  We should use some of the sequester relief in the budget deal to fund 
transit programs and transportation, if necessary. I am proud to 
represent the city of Chicago. Our mass transit is essential. We, of 
course, stand by our infrastructure as well when it comes to highways, 
bridges, and rail service, but it is important that our mass transit 
systems across America be maintained.
  The core capacity and TIGER grants--popular grant programs that have 
benefited the entire Nation--were facing cuts in early versions of 
bills. We can reverse it.
  Senate Republicans funded the HOME Program, which is $66 million. 
That was a 93-percent reduction in funding for this essential housing 
program. We can start to restore money in that area.
  Without the sequester relief provided in the budget deal, $770 
million would be cut from America's schools. Who in the world thinks 
that cutting spending on education is the best thing for America in the 
21st century? We don't want to eliminate critical title I funding for 
the most vulnerable kids in America. In my home State of Illinois 
alone, that amounts to a cut of about $40 million if we stuck with the 
original budget figures. Now, with this agreement, we could provide 
more money for education for the most vulnerable kids.
  This agreement also protects our seniors by preventing Medicare Part 
B premium increases and deep cuts to Social Security disability 
insurance that were scheduled to occur next year. It also extends SSDI 
solvency to 2022 and prevents a 20-percent across-the-board cut in 
disability benefits.
  The idea of sequester relief is not a new one. A similar agreement to 
the one we are voting on this morning was reached in 2013 between 
Senator Patty Murray and then-Congressman Paul Ryan, who yesterday was 
sworn in as the new Speaker of the House. That had widespread 
bipartisan support. This should as well. It was the right thing to do 
then, and it is the right thing to do now.
  Government by manufactured crisis is no way to do the American 
people's business. After months of uncertainty, we have before us a 
plan to remove the seemingly constant threat of defaults and shutdowns.
  The new Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, was very candid yesterday in 
acknowledging the broken system in the U.S. House of Representatives, 
and I think he could point to our side of the Rotunda as well, which 
has a desperate need for more bipartisan solutions. Our work is not 
done even with this agreement.
  I encourage my colleagues to continue in the spirit of compromise and 
a shared goal of growing our American economy and providing fairness to 
American citizens. Let's pass appropriations bills free of ideological 
policy riders that seek to divide us.
  I look forward to joining my colleagues on both sides of the aisle in 
passing this bill. Let's get back to work and face the critical issues 
which American families face every single day.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, yesterday Chairman Hatch and I began 
managing this legislation on the floor of this distinguished body. It 
seems to me that speaking for more than a couple of minutes at this 
point would just be excessive, but I think I want to summarize what the 
central question is at this late hour.
  It would be fair to say that we have spirited debates in the Senate, 
and fiscal battles that play out in this Chamber take place at 
virtually every new cycle and certainly with every election. That is as 
it should be. That ensures that we have vigorous debate about important 
issues the Founding Fathers wanted this Senate to be part of. But that 
must never endanger the sterling economic reputation our country has 
built over the generations, and passing this legislation, in my view, 
helps to preserve that reputation.
  With this bipartisan legislation, it is possible to avert a 
catastrophic default and a mindless sequester, which would give an 
opportunity that the President, the Senate, and I care a great deal 
about, and that would be the opportunity to come up with smart, 
effective, targeted reforms, such as fixing the broken system of 
fighting wildfires in our country. That system is broken today. With 
this legislation and the opportunity to bring a bit more flexibility to 
the cause of reforming our government, there will be an opportunity on 
a bipartisan basis to fix that broken policy which has consumed, 
literally and figuratively, so much of our land in the West.
  To me, having the opportunity to prevent a government shutdown and 
demonstrate once more that our country pays its debts and pays them on 
time is central to our obligations in the Senate--obligations we must 
meet on a bipartisan basis.
  The reality is, as it has been for decades, that America is the 
economic rock in tumultuous seas with this legislation. Once again, we 
preserve our status, our prestige, with the ability to say to the 
world: America pays its debts. Our full faith and credit is intact.
  The reality is the cycle of fiscal crisis has gone on for far too 
long. To me, the Senate ought to view this legislation as, in effect, a 
springboard to go back to very different and robust and bipartisan 
budget debates. The people of this country--certainly the people of my 
State--expect Senators on both sides of the aisle and of differing 
philosophies to come together to solve the big economic challenges 
ahead.
  The reality is, if you count the votes here in the Senate, to get the 
important work done, you have to find some common ground. Neither side 
can forge the progress we need here in this body all by itself. So 
let's pass this bipartisan legislation tonight, and let's reaffirm our 
pledge to protect the full faith and credit of the United States.
  This evening I urge my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans alike, 
to support this important legislation.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Will the Senator delay his 
suggestion?
  Mr. WYDEN. Yes. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time 
during the quorum call be allocated equally.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WYDEN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, the number one threat to our country's 
future is our debt. The number one threat to our national security is 
our debt. This deal gives the President the power to borrow unlimited 
amounts of money. This deal represents the worst of Washington culture. 
The left and the right have come together in an unholy alliance to 
explode the debt. The left gets more welfare, the right gets more 
military contracts, and the taxpayer is stuck with the deal.
  This is a bipartisan busting of the budget caps that will further 
indenture our next generation. I promised the voters of Kentucky to 
oppose deficits, to oppose budgets that don't balance, and to spend 
only that which comes in. I will not give this President any power

[[Page 16908]]

to borrow unspecified amounts of money. Our debt now equals our entire 
economy. Not raising the debt ceiling means we would be forced to only 
spend what comes in--also known as a balanced budget. I could accept 
that. But I can also accept a balanced budget that brings us to balance 
over 5 years. The debt threatens us like never before, and now is the 
time to take a stand. I have traveled far and wide across America. I 
have not met one voter outside of DC who supports adding an unlimited 
increase to the debt ceiling.
  I hope my colleagues will listen and will listen very clearly to 
their constituents before voting for this terrible, rotten, no-good 
deal. The time is now to take a stand. The time is now to say enough is 
enough--no more debt. The very foundation of our country is threatened 
by the addition of debt. This is precisely the time when we should be 
using the leverage of raising the debt ceiling to exact budgetary 
reforms.
  In 2011, that is exactly what we did. We had a compromise that worked 
in the right direction. We had a compromise that said we will set 
limits on both the military and the domestic spending. Instead, what we 
have today is an unholy alliance of right and left. We wonder why the 
deficit grows no matter which party is involved, no matter which party 
is in charge. The deficit continues to grow because, frankly, many are 
not serious about reducing the debt. Many up here are serious only 
about increasing spending for their sacred cow.
  The true compromise that is necessary in America is for both right 
and left to say enough is enough, to say that the particular interests 
they have in spending money is hurting the country. It is time for the 
right to say: You know what; the country is not stronger by going 
further in debt. The country actually, I believe, is weaker. We do not 
project power from bankruptcy court.
  I think the time is now. Enough is enough. We shouldn't be adding 
more debt. The left needs to acknowledge this as well. The left may say 
this is for humanitarian purposes, we want to help people. I don't 
doubt their motives, but I do doubt whether you can help people from 
bankruptcy court. I think we are weakening our country.
  One of the reasons why we have been able to help so many people in 
our country is that we are the richest, most humanitarian country in 
the history of mankind. In the year 2014 alone, we gave away nearly 
$400 billion in private charity in this country. I fear that will not 
continue to last. I fear that as this deficit mounts, as the debt 
mounts, they will drag us down.
  Already some economists estimate that we are losing a million jobs a 
year because of the burden of debt. I think what we need to do is to 
have compromise in Washington, but the compromise needs to be that the 
right and the left need to say we don't have enough money at this 
point. Some say we need to have military readiness. But this week in 
the Armed Services Committee, they talked about $20 billion of waste in 
one program within the military. We have had Secretaries of the Cabinet 
Departments and a Secretary of the Navy saying: You know what; we can 
save money within the Pentagon. But if we keep adding to the top line, 
if we keep adding more money, if we keep spending good money after bad, 
we are going to bankrupt the country.
  I hope my colleagues will listen to their constituents, because I 
have been in 40 of the 50 States and I have yet to meet a single voter 
who says: Keep adding to the debt; keep spending more money.
  What I find is the opposite. They say: Work together to save the 
country. Work together not to add more debt.
  This debt ceiling vote does something that is unprecedented. It 
doesn't even add a certain amount to the debt. It adds an unspecified 
amount. Over the next year or year and a half, we will add as much debt 
as can be crammed into the budget, as much money as can be spent. There 
will be no limit. We are giving an unspecified amount of borrowing 
power to the President. I don't care whether it is a Democratic 
President or a Republican President. It is unconscionable to give 
unlimited borrowing authority to the President.
  As we contemplate this decision, we need to think beyond the short 
term. We need to think beyond the short term of self-constituencies on 
either side of the aisle and say enough is enough. We don't have the 
money. Let's take a stand now and try to reform the process before it 
is too late.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I want to once again express my support for 
the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 and urge my colleagues to vote in 
favor of invoking cloture on this legislation.
  As I have said before, this is not a perfect bill, and I haven't 
heard anyone argue that it is. Indeed, any Senator looking for a reason 
to vote against this budget deal could easily find one.
  However, at the same time, this bill will accomplish a number of 
important tasks and clear a number of hurdles out of our way to allow 
us to govern more effectively in the coming months.
  For example, the bill will suspend the statutory debt limit through 
mid-March of 2017, eliminating the threat of an immediate default and 
ensuring that conflicts over the debt limit do not get swept up in the 
politicking and pandering of next year's election campaign.
  This bill will also extend the life of the Social Security Disability 
Insurance--or SSDI--trust fund for an additional 6 years, preventing 
massive benefit cuts to disabled American workers and removing the 
current uncertainty. It actually goes further than that, putting in 
place SSDI reforms that are the most significant changes to any Social 
Security program in more than 30 years--not an insignificant 
accomplishment.
  In addition, this legislation will prevent millions from seeing huge 
premium hikes in the Medicare Part B Program, again ensuring that our 
seniors don't suffer as a result of political gridlock and 
grandstanding in Congress.
  And it will repeal an unpopular and obviously ineffective provision 
from the so-called Affordable Care Act: the employer auto-enrollment 
requirement.
  Finally, the bill will partially lift the budget caps established 
under the Budget Control Act. And, while I share my colleague's 
concerns about rolling back real spending cuts, I think that it is 
important to note that the bill does not add to the debt, nor does it 
raise taxes. Even more important is the fact that it will increase 
funding for our military at a time when we face so many challenges and 
potential conflicts in the world.
  As I said earlier in this debate, sometimes--many times, in fact--
governing effectively is about the art of the doable. While neither the 
substance of this bill nor the process that got us here are ideal for 
anyone, we need to take a close look at where we are and, more 
importantly, where we want to be in the near future.
  I won't speak for anyone else, but I personally would rather focus on 
substantive, long-term solutions to the problems plaguing our country 
than spending so much time navigating from crisis to crisis. Meaningful 
and lasting policies are very rarely crafted or enacted when we are 
speeding toward a cliff, and this bill would eliminate a number of 
cliffs in our very near future and give us a real chance to do more 
good for the American people.
  Therefore, in addition to voting to move this bill forward, I want to 
call on my colleagues on both sides of the aisle--particularly those 
who have real reservations about the legislation before us today--to 
work with me on these issues. I currently chair the Senate committee 
with jurisdiction over many of these areas, and I have been working for 
a number of years to address these problems.
  I want to reform our entitlement programs in order to put our debt on 
a sustainable trajectory.
  I want to put in place fundamental, long-term fixes for the SSDI 
program and Social Security more generally.
  And I want to work to get long-term spending under control.
  I know many of my colleagues share these desires, and nothing in this 
bill

[[Page 16909]]

prevents us from doing more work to get us where so many of us want to 
be. I am willing to work with anyone--Republican or Democrat--to get us 
there.
  But it will be extremely difficult to do any of this with ticking 
clocks hanging over our heads. That is why, once again, I urge my 
colleagues to vote to move this bill forward.
  This bill has been an important undertaking. And I know that many of 
our leaders are taking no small amount of criticism for the work they 
have done to put it together. I want to thank them for their efforts 
and particularly for their willingness to set aside partisanship and 
political expedience to do what needs to be done.
  Most notably, I want to thank Speaker Boehner for his efforts in 
crafting this compromise and getting it across the finish line. He had 
a difficult road over in the House of Representatives--being Speaker of 
the House is never an easy job. Even if you disagreed with Speaker 
Boehner, which I did from time to time, you could never doubt his 
commitment to the people he represented in Congress and his courage to 
always do what he believed was the right thing for the American people.
  While I have every confidence in the new Speaker of the House--
Speaker Ryan and I have worked well together on a number of issues, and 
I think we can all acknowledge that he is an effective leader--I have 
to say that Speaker Boehner will be missed.
  I also have to once again thank our distinguished majority leader 
here in the Senate. He also has a difficult job and is no less willing 
to take a lot of heat and put up with a lot of criticism in order to do 
the right thing. Under Senator McConnell's leadership, the Senate is 
finally a functioning body where things actually get done. Things 
haven't gone perfectly--they never do--but, I expect that, as time goes 
on, things will continue to get better.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Who yields time?
  If no one yields time, the time will be charged equally to both 
sides.


                             Cloture Motion

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair 
lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will 
state.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to 
     accompany H.R. 1314, a bill to amend the Internal Revenue 
     Code of 1986 to provide for a right to an administrative 
     appeal relating to adverse determinations of tax-exempt 
     status of certain organizations.
         Mitch McConnell, John Cornyn, Lisa Murkowski, John Thune, 
           Lamar Alexander, John Barrasso, Roger F. Wicker, Orrin 
           G. Hatch, John McCain, Thad Cochran, Thom Tillis, 
           Michael B. Enzi, Mike Rounds, Roy Blunt, Susan M. 
           Collins, Shelley Moore Capito.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. By unanimous consent, the mandatory 
quorum call has been waived.
  The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the 
motion to concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to H.R. 
1314 shall be brought to a close?
  The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Murphy) 
is necessarily absent.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Are there any other Senators in the 
Chamber desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 63, nays 35, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 292 Leg.]

                                YEAS--63

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Booker
     Boxer
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coons
     Cornyn
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Franken
     Gillibrand
     Graham
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Hirono
     Kaine
     King
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Leahy
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson
     Peters
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Udall
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                                NAYS--35

     Blunt
     Boozman
     Burr
     Cassidy
     Coats
     Corker
     Cotton
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Flake
     Gardner
     Grassley
     Heller
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Lankford
     Lee
     Moran
     Paul
     Perdue
     Portman
     Risch
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Sullivan
     Toomey

                             NOT VOTING--2

     Murphy
     Vitter
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. On this vote, the yeas are 63, the 
nays are 35.
  Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in 
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
  Cloture having been invoked, the motion to refer falls.
  The Senator from Kentucky.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, could we have order.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senate will be in order.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, the No. 1 threat to our country's future is 
our debt. The No. 1 threat to our national security is our debt. When 
Admiral Mullen was asked about the debt in the recent past, he said 
that it is indeed the debt that is the No. 1 threat to our national 
security.
  This deal gives the President the power to borrow unlimited amounts 
of money. This is extraordinary in the sense that we are not to specify 
how much money the President can borrow; we are to allow the President 
to borrow unlimited amounts of money.
  This deal represents the worst of Washington culture. One of the 
colloquial ways of putting this is guns and butter. What this deal does 
is allow one side to have more guns and one side to have more butter. 
It is the old proverbial guns and butter that is bankrupting this 
country.
  Often people want to point fingers in Washington and out in the 
campaign hustings and they want to say, well, it is Democrats' fault or 
it is Republicans' fault. What this bill shows is it is really the 
fault of both parties. There is an unholy alliance in Washington 
between right and left, frankly, and it is the guns and butter caucus. 
On the right they say we need more money for military. On the left they 
say we need more money for welfare. So they get together, there is a 
secret handshake, we spend more money on everything, and the country is 
going bankrupt as a consequence.
  We borrow $1 million every minute. This threatens the very foundation 
of our country. If we ask people--and I think if we ask people 
throughout America, Republican, Democrat, or Independent--if we ask 
them whether or not it is a good idea to continue to borrow money 
without reforming what we do, to continue borrowing money at an 
alarming rate, they would say enough is enough; we should spend only 
what comes in.
  Now, some have said we shouldn't negotiate over something like 
raising the debt ceiling, that it might potentially cost us our bond 
rating. But the interesting thing is that in 2011 when we had this 
discussion, what we found was that actually our bond rating went down, 
and the S&P bond rating agency said that it went down because we failed 
to enact meaningful budgetary reform.
  Mr. President, could we have order.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senate will be in order.
  Mr. PAUL. Often people wonder why the deficit gets worse, either 
under Republicans or under Democrats. Under the previous Republican 
administration, the debt doubled. It went from $5 trillion to $10 
trillion. Under this administration, it will go from $10 trillion to 
about $20 trillion, although we don't know the exact number because we 
are now letting the President borrow an unspecified amount of money. 
But we are on target to add more debt under this President than all of 
the previous Presidents combined.

[[Page 16910]]

  People ask: Why does this go on? Where are the fiscal conservatives? 
I guess I would maintain that there are very few fiscal conservatives 
on either side of the aisle. Both sides of the aisle have what I would 
call sacred cows. On the right they have the sacred cow of military 
contracts. And then the interesting thing is they say: We don't have 
enough money to properly defend the country. But the interesting thing 
is that when you look at military spending, we actually spend more on 
our military than the next 10 countries combined. Think about it. 
Russia, China, and eight more countries--add up all of their military 
spending, and it still doesn't equal what we spend on the military.
  Since 9/11 we have increased our military spending by 50 percent. How 
do we do that? How do we get the money for the military? It only 
happens by a compromise with the other side. The other side will 
sometimes resist excessive spending in the military, but they say: You 
know what; we will give it to you if you give us what we want. So the 
left wants more domestic spending; the left wants more welfare. The 
right wants more military spending. So what is the unholy alliance? 
What is the great compromise? This is being touted as a bipartisan 
compromise. Well, it is a bipartisan busting of the budget caps. It is 
a bipartisan compromise that is ruining the country.
  The No. 1 threat to our national security is the debt. So for those 
who say that we just need more military spending and somehow we will be 
safer, I think we are actually becoming less safe as we get further and 
further mired in debt. We need to seek something like the opposite of 
this compromise. We could have compromise, but I think the compromise 
would be that the right acknowledges that we don't have an unlimited 
treasury and that we actually are making the country weaker by 
hollowing the country from the inside out through this massive debt 
that we are accumulating.
  I don't think you project power from bankruptcy court. To the left, I 
would say: If your goal is humanitarian, if your goal is to help people 
who are in need, if your goal is to help the poor and help those who 
can't help themselves, we are doing a disservice to the country if we 
are going further into bankruptcy to do so. We have to understand what 
the contrast is.
  We have to understand the contrast between our country and other 
countries. One of the great contrasts and one of the things about 
America that allows us to be the most humanitarian nation probably in 
the history of man is this engine of capitalism. The engine of 
capitalism, however, I think, is being brought down. The engine of 
capitalism is being burdened by this enormous anchor of debt.
  I think we really should be concerned about whether we can continue 
to do the things we do to help our fellow man if we are burdened by 
this debt. So I think both the right and the left mistake their purpose 
here in the short run by saying: Well, we are going to get what we 
want--more money, more money, more money. Frankly, we don't have any 
money. We are borrowing money at $1 million every minute.
  There has been much discussion as I traveled around the country. 
There has been much discussion about education. People say they want 
free education for everyone. They say we should just give education to 
everyone. Well, the interesting thing is this: Do you know to whom we 
give free education? We give $15 million of free education to foreign 
students just for community college. The things that go and riddle 
through the government of what we are spending money on and the reason 
we never get reform is because we are doing this unholy compromise when 
we are not going through item after item after item of waste.
  I will give you a couple of examples of the waste that exists in 
government. We spent $800,000 last year in Afghanistan on a televised 
cricket league--a televised cricket league for Afghanistan, $800,000. 
They don't even have televisions in Afghanistan. Why does this go on? 
Why are we never able to fix any of these problems? Because of the 
unholy compromise between the right and left that skirts these issues 
and continues to blithely go on.
  We do not self-examine what is wrong with government because we 
bundle government into one large continuing resolution in which there 
is no self-examination of waste.
  We spent $150,000 on yoga classes for Federal employees. We spent 
$200,000 last year studying whether Japanese quail are more sexually 
promiscuous when they are on cocaine. The American public is outraged 
at the waste.
  Even within the Defense Department we have had hearings just this 
week that said we wasted $20 billion on one program. This program is 
called Future Combat Systems. So we waste money, but nobody is fixing 
it. The American people are asking themselves: Why does it go on? Why 
is there never any reform? Why? Because there is an unholy alliance 
between the right and the left. Everybody gets what they want. The 
right will get more military money, and the left will get more welfare 
money--guns and butter in abundance. Who gets stuck with the bill? The 
taxpayer. The taxpayer is stuck and burdened with the bill, and we have 
made our future generations indentured servants. We are making the next 
generation bear the burden of our profligate ways, and there is no 
sustained force to say enough is enough.
  When we look at waste in the military, former Secretary of the Navy 
John Lehman, who was the youngest Secretary of the Navy under Reagan, 
has said that he believes we do need to modernize our navy. He thinks 
we do need more ships. But he also says we should pay for it by 
reducing the costs in the Pentagon by reducing the bureaucracy in the 
Pentagon. When John Lehman was Secretary of the Navy there were seven 
joint task forces. There are now 250 joint task forces.
  But here is what I would ask you: We have this program about which we 
pointed this out last week called Future Combat Systems--$20 billion 
worth of waste in the Pentagon. Do you think it is going to get fixed 
if we raise the level of money we spend? The only way waste is ever 
ferreted out is if we lower the amount. If you lower the top line 
number, if you lower the amount of money that is given, waste will have 
to be ferreted out. In fact, what we need are the constraints of the 
marketplace that ferret out waste within the private marketplace.
  The opposite happens in government. When you look at government 
spending and you look at it department by department, what really 
happens is the opposite. As each department gets to the end of their 
fiscal year, what do they do with the remaining money? They spend it. 
They try to spend their money at the end so they will get it the next 
year.
  I proposed a budgetary reform which wouldn't fix the entire 
government, but it would actually do something I think to lead us in 
the right direction. I proposed legislation that I think actually would 
help to right some of the problems and try to have correct incentives 
in the way we spend our money, both on the military side as well as on 
the domestic side. I would give all Federal employees bonuses based on 
cost savings. When the American people read about the waste throughout 
government, they say: How come it never gets better? Do you want to 
know why Congress has a 10-percent approval rating? Because you guys 
just raise all the money. You blithely go on, rubberstamp, and give the 
money. We have to go for the weekend. But there are ways that we could 
reform this. If you gave bonuses to Federal employees for finding 
savings, then you would have the correct incentive--the same kind of 
incentive that you have in private business, which tries to maximize 
profit by reducing costs.
  In government, though, you never get that. In the government people 
keep spending their money and spending their money. In fact, what we 
discovered is that as the fiscal year comes to a close, spending 
accelerates and multiplies. People spend more money in the last month 
than they spend in the other 11 months. They spend more money in the 
last week than they spend in the early weeks. They spend more money in 
the last day of the fiscal year than on any other day of the year. In 
fact, as the sun rises and as

[[Page 16911]]

the sun sets, you can watch the spending accelerate on the last day of 
the fiscal year. As 5 o'clock approaches in the East, there is a fury 
to spend money. As the sun continues into the West and to Federal 
agencies in California, they are spending it like crazy as 5 p.m. 
approaches.
  Why don't we fix any of these problems? We don't fix them because we 
have become a rubberstamp and we give everybody what they want. The 
right gets their money for guns, the left for butter. Guns and butter 
are bankrupting the country.
  What we really need are fiscal conservatives. You can be liberal and 
be a fiscal conservative. You can be conservative and be a fiscal 
conservative. But the problem we have now is that there are people on 
the right who are actually liberal with military spending. I don't 
think you can be a fiscal conservative if you are for unlimited 
spending for the military.
  If you look at what we are spending on the Pentagon, if you look at 
what we are spending on military spending, we spend more than all the 
next 10 countries combined. We have increased our defense spending by 
50 percent. Perhaps we should look at the amount spent and try to 
ferret out waste and try to figure out what is working and what is not 
working. While we are doing it, we should think--and we should think 
long and hard--about whether or not we want to get back involved with 
another war in Iraq.
  The first war in Iraq cost us $1 trillion. In Afghanistan we have now 
spent more than the entire Marshall Plan. We don't have a lot to show 
for it. Many of the things that have been built in Afghanistan have 
been wasted. Much money has been stolen. There are stories repeatedly 
of the Karzai family being involved in drugs and drug running and money 
being wasted and squandered.
  We have to decide this: What is our mission currently in Afghanistan? 
What is the purpose of our mission in Afghanistan? What is the purpose 
of our mission currently in Iran and Iraq? Are we going to be back in 
Iraq with another half million troops over there? Are we prepared to 
spend another trillion dollars in another war in Iraq?
  The message that I am trying to get across tonight is that it is not 
the fault of one party or another. It is the fault of both parties. I 
think the American people actually recognize this because essentially 
there is a universal disdain for all of those in office. If you have 
missed this, if you haven't noticed this, you are missing out on 
something big that is happening in America. What is happening in 
America is that people are very, very upset that nothing seems to 
improve, that the waste continues on and the spending continues on.
  Look at projects that are wasteful. I will give you another example 
of a project that really annoys people. This project is one where we 
spent $250,000 bringing 24 kids from Pakistan and bringing them to 
Space Camp in Alabama. There are hundreds and hundreds of these 
projects. We have American kids who can't afford to go to Space Camp in 
Alabama. What in the world are we doing borrowing money from China to 
send it to Pakistan to bring some of their kids to Space Camp? It is 
outrageous. We are bankrupting the country with this, and it goes on 
and on.
  One of the reasons there is never any reform in our spending is 
because we don't address spending the way we properly should. There are 
12 different departments of government and about 10 years ago was the 
last time that we actually passed appropriation bills. So there are 12 
departments of government. We should pass them and exercise the power 
of the purse by passing the individual appropriations bills. If we were 
to do that, that is when we would begin to reform. That is when we 
would begin to say that we don't have the money to spend on this. That 
is when we would ask tough questions.
  But Congress has become a shell of itself. Congress has become so 
miniscule as to be almost insignificant. This is with regard to almost 
all policy. The executive branch writes the regulations. The executive 
branch fights the wars, and we do nothing. We have been at war almost 
constantly for the last 20 years. We have been at war in Syria and now 
in Iraq for over a year, and yet Congress has not weighed in.
  Congress has not voted to give the President any authority. Some will 
say: Well, we gave him that authority on 9/11. Well, go back and read 
the use of authorization of force from 9/11. Read the use of 
authorization of force and see what is in there. What you will find is 
in there is that it was directed toward those who attacked us on 9/11. 
Well, they did not attack us from Iraq. Iraq had nothing do with 9/11. 
Yet we use that same resolution from 15 years ago.
  Think about the absurdity of this. Think about the absurdity of using 
a resolution from 2001 to fight war forever. Really, can a vote from a 
Congress--and probably more than half of us were not part of that 
Congress in 2001--can that vote really be used to bind generation after 
generation after generation in perpetual war?
  We find also that it is both sides really. Both sides have supported 
the war in Iraq. You had Hillary Clinton support the war when she was 
here. She now runs away from this. But you also have Hillary Clinton 
who is still involved with wanting us to be back involved in Syria, 
calling for a no-fly zone.
  Before we get involved, should we not have a debate in Congress? 
There is an extraordinary amount of money that is spent. There is an 
extraordinary amount of lives that are lost. In the Iraq war, we spent 
over $1 trillion, but we lost also nearly 5,000 of our brave young men 
and women over there.
  The problem in Washington--and this is an interesting point--many in 
the media point out that the problem is incivility and not getting 
along. I guess I would argue the opposite, that we get along too well, 
that compromise actually comes too easy, and that when you look at 
whether there is enough discussion on whether the debt is harming us, 
there is actually too much agreement on both sides and lack of concern 
really for the debt.
  So you have both sides coming together with this bill to basically 
say that we are going to give the President an unspecified and 
unlimited amount of borrowing power. I think that is bad for the 
country.
  Mr. FRANKEN. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. PAUL. I think I would prefer to finish up. You know what, I think 
each Senator can have an hour. I would love it if you would fulfill the 
next hour and make points about why we really are spending our country 
into oblivion. But I think I am going to finish my hour.
  Mr. President, can you tell me how much time I have remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has approximately 38 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. PAUL. Good.
  When we look at the problem here, it is not really a problem that 
involves a lack of compromise. What we have is both right and left have 
come together--and not just tonight, right and left have been coming 
together for a long time up here. Right and left have been saying: You 
scratch my back, and I will scratch yours. Basically, the compromise 
is, we both get what we want. The right's sacred cow is military 
spending. The left's sacred cow is domestic welfare spending. Both 
sides end up getting what they want, but as a consequence, we borrow $1 
million every minute.
  Many economists have said that our debt is actually the biggest 
threat to our future. Many economists have actually said that our debt 
is actually costing us about 1 million jobs a year. Kids ask me: What 
about a job? What are you going to do to create jobs? What are we going 
to do to keep America strong, to keep America producing and 
manufacturing and creating millions of jobs?
  I think it is the wrong thing to add more debt. I think it is wrong 
to spend money you don't have. So often up here, everybody looks and 
says ``Well, I am going to do this with the money'' when, indeed, the 
first thing we should be asking is where the money is going to come 
from. We borrow the money

[[Page 16912]]

from China, often to send it to Pakistan. We have sent billions of 
dollars to Pakistan.
  I will give you an example of where we could save some money, and yet 
there seems to be very little interest for saving money in Washington. 
I put forward an amendment I think about 6 months ago in the Foreign 
Relations Committee. My amendment said that any country that persecutes 
Christians should not get any of our foreign aid. I have asked people 
about this in Kentucky and across the country: Should a country that 
persecutes Christians get any of our foreign aid? I have not met 
anybody who is in favor of that, and yet almost everybody here is for 
it. The vote was 18 to 2 in the committee to continue sending foreign 
aid to countries that persecute Christians.
  You say: Well, how are you defining that? How do you define the 
persecution of Christians.
  Pretty easily, actually. We define it as any country that puts a 
Christian to death or puts anyone to death for criticizing the state 
religion. In Pakistan, it is the death penalty if you criticize the 
state religion. It is the death penalty if you convert from the state 
religion to any other religion. Yet we pour billions of dollars in 
there.
  When I tried to end the practice of sending money to countries that 
persecute Christians, the response from the other side was, well, this 
money is not going to those who are persecuting Christians, the money 
is going to the moderates to influence their behavior. The problem is 
that there is no objective evidence that they are changing their 
behavior. If you look over the last dozen years, you look over the last 
two decades in Pakistan, are they becoming more friendly to America? 
Are they changing the laws so they don't persecute Christians? Well, it 
is actually probably the opposite. In some ways, there has been more 
radicalization of Pakistan.
  I will give you an example--Asia Bibi. Asia Bibi is a Christian. 
There are not many Christians left in Pakistan. Asia Bibi went to the 
well in a small Muslim village. She went to the well to draw water. As 
she was drawing water, they began to stone her. They stoned her and 
beat her with sticks until she was a bloody pulp. As she lay on the 
ground crying out for help and hoping that someone would show up, 
finally the police came. As the police came, this Christian woman, Asia 
Bibi--when the police came, they did not help her, they arrested her. 
She was arrested and accused of criticizing the state religion. What is 
our response? Our response is to send more money to Pakistan.
  We continue to send money--good money after bad--to countries that 
abuse their citizenry. Look at a country like Saudi Arabia. Many people 
have forgotten that 16 out of the 19 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia. 
We still have some questions from the 9/11 report that do discuss Saudi 
Arabia, the possibility of Saudi Arabia's involvement in the 9/11 
attacks. We also have a Saudi Arabia that has a horrendous human rights 
record. This is a question that has been put forward. Some have said 
that really their goal is to support women's rights, such as Hillary 
Clinton. Yet she has taken tens of millions of dollars from Saudi 
Arabia.
  In Saudi Arabia, there was a young woman who was 17. They called her 
the Girl of Qatif. She was raped. She was gang-raped by seven men. When 
they finally brought about justice in Saudi Arabia, their idea of 
justice was that the girl who was raped was publicly whipped. She was 
whipped for being in the car with an unmarried man.
  If you think foreign aid and selling weapons to a country like Saudi 
Arabia is going to change their behavior, you have got another thing 
coming. If you think selling weapons to Saudi Arabia or selling weapons 
to Egypt is somehow changing their behavior or creating a warm fuzzy 
feeling in the hearts of Saudi Arabians or Egyptians for us, you have 
got another thing coming.
  Over a period of time, we sent $60 billion to Egypt. Probably one-
third to half of that was stolen by one family, the Mubarak family. We 
also sold a lot of weaponry to them. They ended up using some of the 
weaponry on their own people.
  As protesters gathered in Tahrir Square in Cairo about a year ago, as 
these protests were occurring and hundreds of thousands of people were 
showing up, when Mubarak was still in power, Mubarak attempted to quell 
the protest. He attempted to stifle the crowd by spraying tear gas on 
the crowd. That is bad enough, to try to quell protests with brute 
force, but what made it doubly bad is when the Egyptians bent over and 
they picked up the empty cartridge from the tear gas, it said, ``Made 
in Pennsylvania.''
  You see, I think America is a great country. I think by our example 
and by our trade and by our diplomatic engagement with the world, we 
are the shining light for the world. But when we sell weapons to 
countries that then use those weapons to suppress their own people, I 
am not so sure that helps American relations around the world.
  We should participate as a body more in how the money is being spent. 
I think this is one of the points of this resolution. When we see that 
we are giving an unspecified amount of borrowing power to the 
President--we have done it both ways in the past. We have done it this 
way in the past, and I think it is wrong--it was wrong then. But we 
have also done it when we have allowed the President to borrow certain 
amounts. Many people have argued: We should not have a debt ceiling. We 
should never have this problem. It is too disruptive, and we should let 
them borrow as much as they want.
  I really think the opposite. I think we need to put a closer rein on 
what actually happens in government. But I think we also need to 
specify and lay out the entire budget. A good example of this is when 
we had the Ebola outbreak, and people were looking for money, and they 
said there was not enough money. It turns out there was plenty of 
money, but the money was being spent on a lot of bizarre things that 
come out of the NIH. We looked and we found that over $2 million was 
being spent on origami condoms. Well, I think we are fairly good on the 
science of condoms, and an extra $2 million on origami condoms was 
perhaps not the best use of money. But when you bring out these 
outrageous spending examples, you think: Well, certainly we are going 
to fix it, right?
  Every year I think for the past 20 years there has been a waste book 
produced. The waste book has hundreds and hundreds of items that should 
be eliminated. Why are they in there every year? Why have we never 
fixed any of this? It is because we don't do individual appropriations 
bills, we don't look at the individual bills and say: This is how we 
will reform it.
  Some have said: We are not passing those appropriations bills because 
you are trying to tell the President how to spend the money.
  Yes. That is what we are supposed to do. That is what the power of 
the purse is.
  If you ask people around the country what are the things they are 
most unhappy about, I know from talking to Republicans and 
conservatives that the thing they are most unhappy about with us--and 
when I say ``unhappy,'' I mean really unhappy--they are unhappy that we 
are not exercising the power of the purse, that basically we are a 
rubberstamp for Big Government.
  Others will argue--they will say: We need to be the adults in the 
room and we need to govern. We need to govern seamlessly with no 
hiccups.
  I would say there are two potential problems here. You could argue 
that, well, by letting us get close to the brink on the debt ceiling or 
getting close to running out of money, that is disruptive and sends a 
bad signal to the marketplace. You could argue in the short run that 
maybe that is disruptive. But you could also argue that it is 
incredibly disruptive to the country to keep borrowing money at $1 
million a minute. So I think you have to weigh which is worse. Is it 
worse to keep borrowing money at $1 million a minute or is it worse to 
actually have a little bit of uncertainty about the debt ceiling?
  With regard to the debt ceiling, though, if you look at the debt 
ceiling and ask whether we would ever default, we bring in, in tax 
revenue, about $250

[[Page 16913]]

billion a month. Our interest payments lately have been averaging about 
$30 billion. There is actually no risk of defaulting at all.
  We should do the opposite. Instead of scaring the marketplace and 
saying that there is any chance of default, we should say that we have 
no intention of defaulting. We should say that we will not default. In 
fact, we have legislation--I have actually introduced legislation; it 
is called the Default Protection Act. It says that we will not default. 
It says that the first thing we will spend out of our revenue would be 
for our interest. It also says that out of our revenue we would pay for 
Social Security. We would fully fund it. We would pay for Medicare and 
fully fund it. We would pay for our soldiers' salaries. We would pay 
for veterans affairs.
  People say: Well, we have little else.
  You know, then maybe the question should be--maybe government should 
not be doing much beyond interest, soldiers' salaries, veterans 
affairs, Medicare, and Social Security. Maybe that is what government 
should do and nothing else, at least until we got caught up again, at 
least until we had as much money coming in.
  What would happen if we did not raise the debt ceiling? If we don't 
raise the debt ceiling, we have a balanced budget. Is it really so 
awful to concede that we would only spend what comes in? Every American 
family does it. Every American family only spends what comes in. I 
think it would be good for the country to do that.
  But there is an even better way. What many conservatives have offered 
is something called cut, cap, and balance. This is a way we could raise 
the debt ceiling, and we would temporarily raise it for about a 5-year 
period. We would raise the debt ceiling in a gradual manner over about 
a 5-year period. The reason you would do that and the reason I would 
vote for that is I would vote for it because we would be balancing the 
budget. So cut, cap, and balance, we would cut the deficit in half in 1 
year. It is the best way to get on a good footing. Let's go ahead and 
cut out a significant amount in 1 year, and then it makes it a lot 
easier in the successive years if you hold the line.
  Calvin Coolidge was incredible with this kind of stuff. In Amity 
Shlaes' book she goes through in exquisite detail--wonderful detail--
how he ended up balancing the budget. In those days the President was 
paid a pretty good amount for those days. I think it was about 
$100,000, but everything came out of their salary. So when an 
ambassador for France came for dinner, the dinner came out of 
Coolidge's salary. So Coolidge would be down in the kitchen after 
dinner saying: I noticed we cooked five hams. I think we could have 
done with four hams.
  That was the kind of handle he had on expenditures. He also had a 
handle on expenditures throughout government, and he met every week 
with the Treasury Department. He met every week with the Cabinet 
Secretary to say: This is how we are going to stop spending money. This 
is how we are going to stop wasting money.
  Cut, cap, and balance is an alternative to what we are putting 
forward. I think if we were a true, open, and deliberative body we 
would have a vote on that, but no vote has been scheduled for cut, cap, 
and balance. So those of us--and I think there were a significant 
number who said that this was not a good deal. Those of us who believe 
it to be not a good deal were not allowed the opportunity to have an 
alternative.
  The alternative we have is called cut, cap, and balance. In cut, cap, 
and balance, we would cut the debt or cut the deficit in half in 1 
year. We would cap spending.
  This deal actually does the opposite of capping spending. This deal 
actually gets rid of the caps and exceeds the caps on spending. We 
would cap spending at 18 percent of GDP. That means you would multiply 
18 percent by the total dollar amount of the economy and that is what 
we would spend.
  Why did we choose 18 percent? We chose 18 percent because that is 
about what comes in historically on average. If you look over the past 
20 years, we have occasional times when we bring more money in, 
occasional times when we bring in less, but on average we bring in 
about 18 percent. So really if you want to balance your spending--which 
would be the responsible thing if we were responsible adults, if we 
cared about the American people, cared what they thought, and cared 
that they were worried about the debt we were adding--we would spend 
about what comes in. So 18 percent is about what comes in. If we spent 
18 percent, we would have a balanced budget.
  I think people ought to think about it in this perspective: We bring 
in $3 trillion. Our problem isn't so much how much money comes in, our 
problem is that we spend in excess of what comes in.
  Couldn't we just spend what comes in? Couldn't we spend $3 trillion? 
Couldn't we have a strong country? I think we would actually be a 
stronger country if we spent only what comes in. We wouldn't have 
``no'' government, and in some ways we might have a government that was 
even bigger than I desire. If we only spent what comes in, if we spent 
the $3 trillion--and that is all we spent--think how strong we would 
become again as a country. Think about the strength of our marketplace, 
the strength of the stock market, the strength of our job creation if 
we were only spending what comes in.
  This is not a new problem. It has accelerated under this President, 
but I think we should be very ecumenical with the blame. There is 
enough blame to go around. I think there is an unholy alliance. The 
problem in Washington is not lack of cooperation, it is too much 
cooperation. We have decided, right and left, that we want to spend 
more money, but we don't have the money. So what do we do? We say we 
are going to simply borrow it, but there are repercussions to 
borrowing. There are repercussions to spending money we don't have. I 
think this is a point in time when we should reevaluate. It is a point 
in time where maybe you ought to spend time and go home.
  I know when I am at home I don't meet anybody who is for this deal. 
Those who vote for this deal--maybe if you are from a State that isn't 
concerned about the budget, isn't concerned about the debt, you may get 
away with it, but I think people are going to have a rude awakening 
when they get home because outside of DC the antipathy for this deal is 
rising. The anger is rising. The belief that basically everybody needs 
to be sent home from Washington is a rising sentiment in the country 
because we don't appear to be listening.
  If you ask people--and I ask people all the time. Do you think we 
ought to have term limits? The answer is yes.
  Would the Parliamentarian inform me of how much time remains.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Capito). The Senator has 19 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. PAUL. When I have discussed this issue with folks at home, with 
constituents in Kentucky, the question they ask me is, How can you give 
the President an unspecified amount to borrow? Weren't you elected to 
try to stop this? I was elected in 2010 when the tea party movement 
arose. The tea party movement arose--and this is an interesting, maybe 
some say, historical fact--the tea party arose not so much in criticism 
of Democrats; the tea party folks weren't those who really believed the 
Democrats would be fiscally responsible. The tea party arose because 
they were concerned that Republicans weren't being fiscally 
responsible. The tea party arose largely as a rebuke to the Republican 
Party. The tea party arose and said: You know what, bailing out the 
banks wasn't something the average middle class, ordinary, conservative 
Republican supported. We didn't support the bailouts. We didn't support 
President Obama's huge and enormous government stimulus, nearly $1 
trillion. We also don't support borrowing or lending money for these 
programs. There are two ways you can stop this. You can stop this by 
voting against the spending, which there doesn't seem to be a 
significant amount of will in this body on either side of the aisle to 
stop and discontinue this profligate spending. So it is spending and 
borrowing, spending and borrowing. Which comes first? Well, they

[[Page 16914]]

go hand-in-hand, but it is a real problem. I think it is a problem that 
threatens the very fabric of our country, and it is why I ran for 
office.
  The reason I ran for office is because I was concerned we were 
accumulating so much debt that we were piling on debt that ultimately 
could lead to the destruction of our country. People say: Well, we are 
a strong country. The debt will never bring us down.
  We are at a point where our debt basically just about equals our 
economy, 100 percent of our economy, and that is a tipping point. Many 
economists who look at the economics of nations have looked at that and 
said: We are at a tipping point. We are at a point where if we do 
nothing, if we continue to give a blank check to the government, if we 
give a blank check to this President for his final year in office, what 
might happen?
  This is a President who is going to add more debt than all of the 
previous Presidents combined, and we are going to give him a blank 
check? Those who vote for this deal will be giving the President a 
blank check. They will say: You can borrow whatever you want. Fill in 
the blank.
  That ought to be the title of this bill: ``Fill in the blank.''
  How much debt do you want? Fill in the blank.
  There is no specific amount. This bill will allow for unlimited 
addition of debt. This bill is exactly why people are upset and angry 
with Washington.
  The fact that this bill is going to slide through is exactly why 
Congress has about a 10-percent approval rating. People here scratch 
their heads and can't figure it out. This is why. They don't want you 
to act like adults and govern over this enormous debt. They want you to 
act. They want you to do something. They want you to quit the borrowing 
and spending.
  The lesson that needs to be learned is that this isn't one-sided. 
This is not the fault of one party, this is a two-party problem. These 
are the two parties getting together in an unholy alliance and spending 
us into oblivion.
  People say: Well, how will we defend the country? Don't we need more 
money?
  We have increased military spending by 50 percent since 9/11 in real 
dollars. There is waste in the Pentagon. I have been arguing that we 
should audit the Pentagon. The Pentagon says they are too big to be 
audited. How insulting. It goes on and on.
  The frustration of the American people is that as it goes on and on, 
nothing ever changes. The establishment in Washington is completely and 
utterly tone deaf to the way America feels about this. All you have to 
do is drive outside the beltway, enter into America, and ask the first 
person you meet at a supermarket: Do you think we should keep borrowing 
more money?
  I don't care what party they are in. I defy you to drive outside the 
beltway, stop at a gas station, stop at a supermarket, and ask the 
first person: Do you think we should increase the debt and increase 
spending at the same time? Do you think we should increase the debt? Do 
you think we should increase the debt ceiling with an unspecified 
amount?
  Ask any parent of a college-age kid whether we should give them a 
credit card with no limit. If your child comes to you and has $2,000 on 
the credit card, what do you do? You tell them they have to watch their 
spending. Do you give them more money? No.
  Should we give Congress more money? Hell, no. Congress is bad with 
money. They are not good with money. Do not trust them with any more 
money. It is a mistake, a huge mistake, to give this body any more 
money. We should be doing the opposite. We should be binding this body 
with the chains of the Constitution that say only certain powers were 
delegated to Congress, only certain powers under article I, section 8, 
and we shouldn't allow for unlimited government.
  Our Founding Fathers were concerned about a big government, but they 
were also concerned about a big and overwhelming military that was 
there all the time and would tend to grow. Even some of our greatest 
heroes--President Eisenhower worried about the military industrial 
complex. So there have been leaders in the past who have said we have 
to be careful that we don't get to a point where the contractors are 
driving Congress, where the contractors are creating a situation in 
which their concerns and their well-being are more important than the 
well-being of the country.
  Will the Parliamentarian report on the time remaining.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 13 minutes remaining.
  Mr. PAUL. Some will criticize this exercise of keeping the Senate 
awake at night. The rumblings can be heard, but what I would say is 
that the future of the country is worth the time spent. One of the 
reasons we are spending the middle of the night discussing this is that 
we don't have an ordinary process for proposals. We don't have an 
ordinary process for amending bills.
  Were there to be an ordinary process where conservatives would be 
allowed an alternative such as cut, cap, and balance--we actually did 
that in 2011 when the opposite party was in charge. We did have a vote 
on cut, cap, and balance. It actually passed. It passed in the House 
overwhelmingly and was defeated in the Senate, but the fact is there 
are other alternatives. There isn't just one alternative. The only 
alternative shouldn't be that we continue to go further and further 
into debt.
  Sometimes people say: Well, I can't even conceive of $1 trillion. It 
is just this enormous money, this enormous amount of money. What is $1 
trillion?
  To illustrate what $1 trillion is, imagine if you had thousand-dollar 
bills in your hand and you had thousand-dollar bills stacked four 
inches high. That would be $1 million. But if you want to imagine $1 
trillion, in thousand-dollar bills it would be 63 miles high. That is 
what we are talking about adding.
  While they have not specified how much debt they are going to burden 
us with, many are estimating that it will be over $1 trillion. So when 
you think about what your government is doing to you tonight, think 
about how much of a burden of debt the next generation will get in just 
the next year, just from this bill over the next year and a half--over 
$1 trillion. If you want to know how much that is, imagine thousand-
dollar bills stacked 63 miles high. That is the burden we are passing 
on to the next generation.
  None of this is an argument for no government. None of this is an 
argument for no Federal Government. In fact, this is an argument for 
just spending what comes in. We actually have a lot of money that comes 
in; $3 trillion comes in. Could we not simply live with the $3 trillion 
that comes in? What would happen to the country if we only spent what 
comes in? Would there be some sort of calamity? I think it would 
actually be the opposite. I think it would send a signal to the world 
that we are serious, that we are going to make America great again. 
America's greatness was founded upon fiscal sanity, small government.
  Liberty thrives when government is small. We need a government that 
is small and restrained by the Constitution. If we had a government 
that was restrained by the Constitution, we wouldn't be in this fix. 
Many of the functions of government we do up here are not written into 
the Constitution and were never delegated to the Federal Government. 
The reason we have gotten into this fix is because we have gotten away 
from the confines of the Constitution.
  Jefferson once said that the chains of the Constitution will bind 
government. Patrick Henry said that the Constitution is not about 
restraining the people; the Constitution was intended to restrain the 
government.
  There has been a long history of this. This is not something that has 
occurred overnight. If you want to go back and see the history of 
people trying to restrain their government and keep their government 
small, you can probably go back to the plains of Runnymede in 1215. 
When the Magna Carta was passed, that was one of the first explicit 
sort of explosions of people saying to government enough is enough; the 
king does not have unlimited power.

[[Page 16915]]

  This goes against the character and the charter of the Magna Carta, 
which tried to limit the power of the monarch. Instead, we are giving 
unlimited power to borrow to the President. So if you look at the 
character of the Magna Carta and you look at the character of our 
Founding Fathers, who wanted to have restraint, who wanted government 
to be restrained by rules, what you find is that we are going headlong 
in the wrong direction. What we need is to obey the Constitution once 
again. When we obey the Constitution, I think what would happen is that 
the budget would balance almost automatically. It would balance every 
year.
  Washington does need to have compromise, but this is the wrong kind 
of compromise. The compromise is going in the wrong direction. What we 
need is compromise that actually reduces spending. Instead, we have 
compromise, or so-called compromise, that is actually increasing 
spending.
  This deal will give the President unspecified and unlimited power to 
borrow money without limits. In the President's last year in office he 
will be able to borrow whatever--no limits whatsoever. We are 
abdicating our role as a constitutional body to limit and check the 
power of the Presidency with this.
  Some will say: Oh, you are only saying this because it is a President 
of the opposite party. I would be saying this if it were a President of 
either party because we have allowed too much power to gravitate to the 
Presidency, and this allows even more.
  Will the Parliamentarian give an update on the time remaining.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 5\1/2\ minutes remaining.
  Mr. PAUL. In the remaining time, I would like to talk about a budget 
point of order that I will be putting forward. This legislation does 
something that many in this body have been critical of in the past. It 
actually takes money from the obligations to Social Security and 
transfers them to a more immediate program.
  Specifically written into the budget rules, though, were rules that 
say: If you are going to take money, if you are going to steal money 
from Social Security, from people who are retired and who have put it 
in there, and you are going to spend it on something else, there is a 
special budget point of order that says in order to do this you will 
need 60 votes. So we will be putting forward a budget resolution that 
says: If you are going to steal money from Social Security, if you are 
going to take money from Social Security and you are going to spend it 
on other concerns--people will say: Oh, well, we are going to spend it 
on disability. Well, the Social Security fund was put forward as a 
pension plan. You have an obligation to those who put the money in. So 
stealing money from people who will be getting money in the future to 
pay for immediate concerns is robbing Peter to pay Paul.
  So those in this body will be asked tonight to vote on whether or not 
you are willing to vote to take money from Social Security to spend it 
on immediate concerns. This is sort of like saying: All right, I have a 
pension fund. Let's say I have $100,000 in my pension plan, but I want 
to go to the racetrack and I need some money this week. So I am willing 
to take the $100,000 out, and I am willing to pay a $30,000 penalty. I 
am willing to do it because I am an addict, and I am addicted to 
spending, and I have to spend the money now.
  That is what it is, and you are all guilty of it, right and left. You 
are going to take money out of the Social Security fund, and you are 
going to spend it on an immediate fix. And by fix, I mean not fixing 
the program. By fix, I mean what a junkie does. A junkie is addicted to 
spending. That is what the problem is here, that we are addicted to 
spending.
  So, Madam President, at this point I raise a point of order against 
the pending motion pursuant to section 311(a) of S. Con. Res. 11, the 
concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2016. The 
legislation reallocates payroll between the retirement and disability 
programs and therefore breaches the budget act. I ask for the yeas and 
nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, pursuant to section 904 of the 
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 and the waiver provisions of 
applicable budget resolutions, I move to waive all applicable sections 
of that act and applicable budget resolutions for purposes of the House 
message, and I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  Mr. PAUL. Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The yeas and nays have been ordered.
  Is there further debate on the motion to waive?
  If not, the question is on agreeing to the motion to waive.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 64, nays 35, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 293 Leg.]

                                YEAS--64

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Booker
     Boxer
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coons
     Cornyn
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Franken
     Gillibrand
     Graham
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Hirono
     Kaine
     King
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Leahy
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Peters
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Udall
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                                NAYS--35

     Blunt
     Boozman
     Burr
     Cassidy
     Coats
     Corker
     Cotton
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Flake
     Gardner
     Grassley
     Heller
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Lankford
     Lee
     Moran
     Paul
     Perdue
     Portman
     Risch
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Sullivan
     Toomey

                             NOT VOTING--1

       
     Vitter
       
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 64, the nays are 
35.
  Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in 
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
  The majority leader.


            Vote on Motion to Concur With Amendment No. 2750

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I move to table the motion to concur 
with the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
  The motion was agreed to.


                        Vote on Motion to Concur

  Mr. McCONNELL. I know of no further debate on the motion to concur.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate?
  If not, the question is on agreeing to the motion to concur.
  Mr. TILLIS. 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. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 64, nays 35, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 294 Leg.]

                                YEAS--64

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Booker
     Boxer
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coons
     Cornyn
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Feinstein

[[Page 16916]]


     Franken
     Gillibrand
     Graham
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Hirono
     Kaine
     King
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Leahy
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Peters
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Udall
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                                NAYS--35

     Blunt
     Boozman
     Burr
     Cassidy
     Coats
     Corker
     Cotton
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Flake
     Gardner
     Grassley
     Heller
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Lankford
     Lee
     Moran
     Paul
     Perdue
     Portman
     Risch
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Sullivan
     Toomey

                             NOT VOTING--1

       
     Vitter
       
  The motion was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.

                          ____________________