Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act--Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, when the Republican majority forced through a $1.5 trillion tax cut to big corporations and the richest Americans, a big question was, What will those companies do with the money? Roughly, $1 trillion of that $1.5 trillion was aimed at the biggest corporations.

Republicans promised that corporations would reinvest the savings from the tax bill, stimulating jobs and economic growth. We Democrats warned that corporations would do what is best for themselves, not necessarily what is best for workers or the economy. There is often a dichotomy, as we have learned over the years.

It has been only a few months since the Republican tax cut was signed into law, and while a few corporations here and there announced annual bonuses with a whole lot of hoopla from the President and the Republicans, we don't hear a peep now that they have been announcing an avalanche of corporate stock buybacks--an absolute bonanza for corporate leaders and for wealthy shareholders. Over $200 billion in corporate buybacks have been announced since January, putting corporations on pace to spend over $1 trillion this year buying back their own stock.

This morning, the oil and gas giant Chevron announced it expects to restart its share repurchasing program since halting it in 2015. Why? Because they just reaped $2 billion in savings from the Republican tax bill. Chevron told the Houston Chronicle last week it is planning no major changes or benefits given to its workers. Let me repeat that. Chevron is planning no major benefits to its workers but huge stock buybacks. Is that what America wants? No, but that is what is happening, as we predicted, with this tax bill.

The Chevron example is not alone, unfortunately, my fellow Americans. An analysis by Just Capital found that 6 percent of the savings companies received from the tax bill are going to employees, while 58 percent are going to shareholders in the form of dividends, share buybacks, and retained earnings. The problem is, buybacks don't really help workers or average Americans. They don't really grow the economy. In fact, the money corporations spend on buybacks crowds out investment in the things that do help workers and help our economy--research, development, new equipment, new hires, better pay for employees. But those benefits are in the long term. The corporate CEOs, the boards, the leaders of the corporations--the big ones--get an immediate benefit when they buy back stock. The stock goes up, the shareholders are happy, but workers and America get no benefit.

What buybacks accomplish is the funneling of even more money to corporate executives and wealthy shareholders. Buybacks don't help the American workers. They don't grow the economy. By taking stock off the market, corporations inflate the value of their stockholdings.

Who holds all this stock? Not average Americans. The richest 10 percent of America owns 80 percent of the stock. That is including pension funds and everything else. When corporations goose their stock, those benefits go to a tiny piece of the pie--the upper crust.

(Mr. CRAPO assumed the Chair.)

This is the legacy of the tax bill: further benefits to the wealthy, incentives to raise corporate pay and stocks, and no real help--minimal real help for workers. Just as Democrats predicted, the Republican bill has unleashed a tsunami of corporate backslapping, while working Americans get left behind. Net Neutrality

Mr. President, now on an entirely different matter, yesterday Washington became the first State to institute its own net neutrality requirements after the Republican-led FCC voted to repeal net neutrality in December, helping the big ISPs and hurting the average consumer. That is typical of what the Senate on the Republican side and what our President have been doing. Over half of the States have similar legislation pending in their legislatures. The States are rightly concerned about what the end of net neutrality may mean for their residents.

When the Republican-led FCC repealed net neutrality, they handed the large internet service providers--your cable company--all the cards. They said: Do what you will with the internet. ISPs could charge consumers more for faster service or start segmenting the internet into packages, forcing consumers to purchase faster times for their favorite websites. Big companies could pay to get faster internet service, while startups, small businesses, and average Americans are left in the slow lane. High-demand websites that offer streaming television, sports, and movies could be slower if you don't pay up. Public schools that don't pay for premium service could be put at a significant disadvantage. In rural America, where there is less competition, ISPs will wield even greater power to raise the price on consumers without fear of losing business.

An internet without net neutrality is a tale of two internets where the best internet goes to the highest bidder, those with the money, and everyone else loses.

Democrats want to keep the internet free and open, like our highways, accessible and affordable to all Americans regardless of your ability to pay, where you live, or the size of your business, no slow lanes, no paying for internet packages, like cable, no one set of rules for big corporations and another for everyone else. Every American should be able to affordably and easily access the internet. That is what Democrats believe.

I am glad Washington State has already taken action to reinstitute net neutrality, but we need to do it across the country. Democrats have put together a CRA that would undo the FCC's decision and put net neutrality back on the books. As you know, Mr. President, we will be able to bring that to the floor. Every Democrat has signed on, but only one Republican has--Susan Collins. I say to the other 50 Republicans who are in this Chamber: Whose side are you on? Whose side are you on-- the big cable providers or the average consumer who depends on the internet? This vote will determine that.

I urge all Americans--particularly our younger people--to contact their Senators and demand that they sign up to save the internet.

One final point. President Trump campaigned as a populist, but what he and our Republican colleagues have been doing over and over again-- whether it is what they tried to do on healthcare, whether it is the tax bill, net neutrality, or anything else--they want to help the wealthiest and the most powerful. They are the ones who backed them and funded their campaigns. That is wrong. That is not what America wants.

The only good news I can see out of this is that Americans are realizing this. Over 70 percent of people believe that Donald Trump favors the wealthy over the middle class, despite how he campaigns and despite his occasional rhetoric and tweets. They are realizing that the Republican Party seems to favor them. It is just that the Democrats, whether we had the Presidency or the majority in the House or the Senate, were able to block these things until now. Now the wealthy and powerful are getting far too much, and I believe my Republican colleagues will reap the whirlwind.

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