[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 4909-4910]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              BORDER WALL

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, finally, on the wall--a place where there 
may be more agreement between some of us than on Judge Garland--last 
night we learned that the Trump administration will be seeking deep 
cuts

[[Page 4910]]

to critical domestic programs in order to pay for a border wall. The 
administration is asking the American taxpayer to cover the cost of a 
wall--unneeded, ineffective, and absurdly expensive--that Mexico was 
supposed to pay for. He is cutting programs that are vital to the 
middle class in order to get that done.
  They want to cut the New Starts Transportation Program and TIGER 
grants. These are the lifeblood of our road and tunnel and bridge 
building efforts. Build a wall or repair or build a bridge or tunnel or 
road in your community? What a choice. They want to cut off NIH funding 
for cancer research to pay for the wall. How many Americans would 
support that decision? They want to cut programs that create jobs and 
improve people's lives--all so the President can get his ``big, 
beautiful wall''--a wall that we don't need and that will be utterly 
ineffective. Think about that. The President wants to slow down cancer 
research and make the middle-class taxpayer shoulder the cost of a wall 
that Mexico was supposed to pay for. He wants to cut funding for roads 
and bridges to build a wall that Mexico was supposed to pay for.
  The proposed cuts the administration sent up last night will not 
receive the support of very many people, I believe, in this Chamber. 
These cuts would be bad for the American people. They are not what the 
American people want, and they are completely against one of the 
President's core promises in his campaign. I believe they will be 
vigorously opposed by Members on both sides of the aisle.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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