Appropriations

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, on a different subject, I return this morning to the topic of appropriations.

We have until the end of this work period to figure out a way to continue government funding, and there is good talk of a short-term continuing resolution so the government doesn't run out of money on September 30. Yet the larger question is how this Chamber is going to proceed or not proceed with the 12 appropriations bills that fund our government.

Despite many disagreements between the majority and minority in this Chamber, the Senate has been able to produce several bipartisan budget deals even in the Trump era. The reason we have been able to do this is that both parties have been committed to working together throughout each stage of the appropriations process. Bipartisanship-- appropriations can only work with it and will not work without it.

Earlier this summer, the Democrats and the Republicans negotiated the broad outlines of a budget deal in good faith. We allocated the 302(a)s and came up with a side agreement. After that, the very first step in the appropriations process is to agree, in a bipartisan way, with the allocations for the 12 subcommittees of the Appropriations Committee. That is what we did in 2018, and I believe it passed the committee unanimously--or maybe with one dissenting vote. It was passed unanimously on a bipartisan basis. The Appropriations Committee passed those 302(b) allocations 31 to 0. That is how we thought it was going to work now, but already we are running into trouble with those allocations this time around.

The Republican majority on the Appropriations Committee has unilaterally proposed putting in an additional $12 billion for the President's border wall, taking away $5 billion of funding for Health and Human Services--desperately needed programs like healthcare and fighting opioid addiction and cancer research--and putting it into the wall. This is without our OK, without our acknowledgment, and without our acceptance. The Republican majority also reprogrammed funding from other sources and backfilled money the President proposes to pilfer for military construction, which has affected, I believe, 30 States.

My Republican colleagues and my friend the Republican leader know very well this will not fly with Senate Democrats. We are not going to vote for a budget that is partisan and is attempting to be jammed down our throats. It puts an additional $12 billion into the wall? Forget that. So here we are already--at step No. 1 in the appropriations process--and the spirit of bipartisanship that is necessary for this work might be melting away.

I just warn my Republican colleagues that this is not a way to produce a budget. This is the same path they tried to go down last year. They shut down the government and then had to walk it back. We all know what a partisan process looks like. President Trump caused the longest government shutdown in American history by demanding funding for a border wall and then by shutting down the government when Congress didn't give it to him. Let's not go down that exact path again 9 months later.

There is still time to get the process back on track. The Republican majority should sit down with the Democrats on the committee and, in good faith, come up with the 302(b) allocations and come up with the order by which we bring bills to the floor. Then we can get this done. We don't have to go back to a CR. Certainly, our side wants to avoid a Republican shutdown, and we hope our Republican colleagues will have the good sense not to let President Trump lead them into that cul-de- sac once again. So let's sit down and make this work. That is what we want to do, not unilaterally declare something and say, ``Take it or leave it,'' but work together so both sides have to give.

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