National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018 -- Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, I would also like to respond to what the majority leader said this morning on healthcare. My good friend Senator McConnell continues to try and create this straw man because he has nothing good to say about his bill. He wants to make this healthcare debate about a false choice between Graham-Cassidy on their side and single payer on our side, but as Senators Sanders and Klobuchar made clear in an excellent debate last night on CNN, Democrats have a lot of ideas to improve healthcare. There is not just one; there are many, and many Democrats support a bunch of different ideas. Each of our ideas, however, endeavors to increase coverage, improve the quality of care, and lower the cost of care. None of the Republican plans achieve these goals. That is the difference.

The difference is that one side wants to cut healthcare to average Americans, increase premiums, and give the insurance companies far more freedom, and one side wants to increase care to the number of people covered, lower premiums, and provide better coverage. That is the divide.

Our colleagues can't stand and debate that issue. They believe in letting the market have more say. We have learned that, left alone, the poor little consumer against a big market gets crushed in healthcare because there are infirmities. It doesn't work like an ordinary market for a whole lot of reasons. So we are happy to have a debate on the real issues.

Does Graham-Cassidy expand or reduce healthcare? They are rushing this through so we don't get a full CBO report. I am sure my colleagues on the other side of the aisle maybe breathed some relief there. CBO said that costs are likely to go way up for older Americans and Americans with preexisting conditions under Graham-Cassidy. They said that Graham-Cassidy would reduce coverage by gutting Medicaid and reducing subsidies that help Americans afford insurance. So there is, indeed, a contrast between the parties. It is a contrast we welcome.

Every Republican plan this year would cause millions to lose insurance and costs to go up, whereas Democrats are looking at many different ideas about how to achieve the exact opposite.

As my colleague said, we want to work in a bipartisan way to improve the existing system. Senator Alexander and Senator Murray have had great negotiations. Once this repeal effort is dead and gone--this repeal and replace--we are willing and eager to sit down and come up with bipartisan improvements and do it in the regular order, as some of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have correctly and courageously recommended. Let's do it in regular order.

Senators Alexander and Murray have had hearings, called in witnesses, and have had a lot of bipartisan discussions--just what this body is supposed to do. Let's realize that Graham-Cassidy is highly unpopular with the American people, doesn't do what some are saying it does, and cuts healthcare. Democrats don't want to do that, and neither do the American people. Let's move on and try to make our system better.

Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands Recovery Effort

Mr. President, the main subject I am going to speak on today is that instead of trying to take healthcare away from millions of Americans, the Senate and the White House should focus on a much more pressing matter this week: the desperate situation in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

After suffering from the winds and rains of Hurricanes Irma and Maria, the island of Puerto Rico is completely devastated. I can't recall in my lifetime a hurricane wreaking such devastation on any part of the United States. There are 3.5 million American citizens facing one of the gravest humanitarian crises in recent memory.
Listen to these facts. Nearly the entire island is without power. The reserves of gas and diesel fuel are dangerously low; there may be a 20- day supply left. I read in the newspaper this morning that 80 percent of the major power lines--the big trunk lines that deliver power--are down. Without power, just think of what that does.

The Governor of Puerto Rico said last night that 40 percent of the people on the island lack potable water; some estimates say it is as much as 65 percent. The food supply is dwindling, so people are without food. Fewer than 250 of the island's 1,600 cell phone towers are operational. People can't find their parents, children, or relatives.

There is no way to reach them.

I remember the day of 9/11 when cell phone service went out in New York and I couldn't reach my daughters. This has been going on for days and days and days.

The damage to one of the largest dams on the island has created the need for another massive evacuation, but with 95 percent of the cell phones out of service in that part of the island, the evacuations have to be carried out by officials going door-to-door to the nearly 70,000 residents in harm's way, telling them that they have to leave their homes. Worse still, the damage to Puerto Rico's roads, bridges, and ports have isolated communities and delayed the arrival of aid.

It is not hyperbolic to say that the two storms together have set Puerto Rico back decades. The damage is apocalyptic. It is Biblical.

The situation on the U.S. Virgin Islands is similar. Words and statistics can hardly begin to describe the devastation these Americans are beginning

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to grapple with. It has hit home. One of my staffers couldn't find an uncle, and they found him dead on the Virgin Islands last night. So it hits home to all of us and to all Americans. Looking at the pictures and the news reports, the islands now resemble a war zone.

What we need to do now is provide aid to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands as quickly as humanly possible--water, food, power, shelter. They need help and they need it now.

Here is what should happen. First, President Trump must issue a full disaster declaration for all of Puerto Rico. Right now, 24 of the 78 municipalities on the island are not eligible for FEMA grants to rebuild their homes.
President Trump should also waive the local cost-share requirement for emergency funds so that Puerto Rico can rebuild without having to worry about falling even deeper into debt.

While our Nation's Armed Forces--and we salute our Armed Forces all the time--are already assisting Puerto Rico, more needs to be done. As the most experienced part of our government in the movement of food, water, mobile power, and medical supplies, the Department of Defense should immediately determine what additional resources and capabilities can be deployed to aid Puerto Rico. If Secretary Mattis hasn't already met with the Director of FEMA, I hope he will do it today.

Most importantly, the administration should prepare an immediate and interim emergency aid request, and the majority leader should put that package on the floor of the Senate before we leave this week. Anything less would be an abject failure of our duty to come to the aid of our fellow U.S. citizens.

The administration submitted a request for Hurricane Harvey less than a week after the storm made landfall. We are rapidly closing in on that same marker for Maria having hit Puerto Rico. We need to move fast. We need to move now. Lives are at stake.

This morning I saw that President Trump had tweeted that Puerto Rico was in ``deep trouble,'' but relief efforts were ``doing well.'' With all due respect, President Trump, the relief efforts are not doing well. They are not close to good enough. All any American needs to do is open up a newspaper or turn on a TV to know that Puerto Rico is not doing well.

In his tweets, President Trump also brought up the issue of Puerto Rico's debt. Now, that is a totally different issue, and it pales in comparison to the immediate humanitarian crisis faced on the island.

Again, now is not the time, Mr. President. Puerto Rico needs help from aid workers, not debt collectors from Wall Street. Yes, Puerto Rico needs debt relief, but first they need humanitarian relief--water, food, medicine, fuel.

But this fits a pattern of how our President unfortunately responds to natural disasters. He insists that relief and recovery efforts are ``doing well'' or ``doing great,'' and sometimes it has no relation to the facts on the ground, as if this is a public relations campaign and not a rescue, recovery, and rebuilding operation. The time for tweets and talk is over.

The American citizens in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands need action and results. The best thing the President can do is to get all of the relevant people in his administration together and come up with an aid package and deliver it to us in the next day or two so that we can pass it before we leave here this week.
Again, instead of trying to take away healthcare from millions of Americans--that is what we are debating now, and that effort seems to be in real trouble--the Trump administration and the Republican majority should put an emergency aid package on the floor before the week is out.

Carmen Yulin Cruz, the mayor of San Juan, said earlier today: ``We need to get our act together because people are dying.'' The situation is desperate. The need is urgent. It is time to act now.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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