Budget
Floor Speech
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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor to talk about the $1.9 trillion spending bill that is under consideration before this Congress.
As President Biden has said repeatedly, if you want to know someone's values, look at one's budget. Well, that is what we are doing, because I believe that President Biden is right. If the American people want to know the Democrats' values, all we need to do is look at the budget. The Democrats are making clear what they stand for. It seems that they are standing for teachers unions and job-crushing mandates on American businesses. The Republicans stand for ending the pandemic, for getting people back to work, and for getting kids back to school. The differences could not be more clear.
The Senate has debated the Democratic budget--we did it a couple of weeks ago--and we voted on many amendments. Every Senator had a chance to propose and make some changes to the budget that was brought forth. Every single Senator went on record on a number of amendments and items related to the budget for the United States of America. Now we know where we stand.
I introduced an amendment that had to do with energy production in my home State of Wyoming. Wyoming feels like we are being targeted by President Biden because of his ban on oil and gas exploration on public lands. You know, those projects are a major source of jobs in my home State. They fund our schools, our roads, our bridges, our teachers, our students, and additional services for working families.
My amendment would provide funding for our public schools--schools that have been punished by this ban announced by President Biden. That amendment on this floor received 98 votes out of 100. It got the support of every single Democrat in the U.S. Senate, so I am grateful for my colleagues for that support of the amendment to protect our students and our schools and our teachers. Yet I have to say that by voting for my amendment, the 98 people in this body--specifically the Democrats--are admitting that there is a problem created by the actions of President Biden. They are admitting that President Biden's Executive order, signed on the day he was inaugurated, is hurting families all across the country.
So, to my Democratic colleagues, keep working with us to address the needs of the Nation. Stand up to these overreaching, radical proposals by the Biden administration. On issue after issue, that really has not yet happened.
Many of my Republican colleagues, on this side of the aisle, offered good ideas that the Democrats refused to support. Senator Blunt introduced an amendment to reopen America's schools. Now, that is an idea that science has supported for months. Every Republican voted yes. Every Democrat voted no. I have yet to hear one of my Democratic colleagues make the case for keeping the schools closed; yet that is how they voted when it came to the budget. Just like President Biden, they are trying to have it both ways. They say they want the schools open; yet they don't do what needs to be done.
President Biden has claimed time and again he wants the schools open; yet his Chief of Staff says there is no money to reopen them. Well, that is absolutely wrong. Last year, President Trump signed into law $68 billion for our schools, specifically tied to coronavirus relief. Only $5 billion of that money has been spent. That leaves $63 billion still available. In the Democrats' budget being proposed right now, almost all of the money for schools is not even for this year. Ninety- five percent of the money is for the years 2022 through 2028--after the coronavirus will be behind us.
The Democrats are still putting the teachers unions ahead of students. Joe Biden has surrendered to the teachers unions. They have written to him a ransom note, and he has been happy to pay it. Teachers are putting politics ahead of science, and so is this administration.
I joined with Senator Scott of South Carolina to introduce another amendment to the budget bill of the Democrats. It said that if we give money to States--and there is a lot of money in this proposal to give money to States: New York, Illinois, California--that the States have to give the American people accurate data about the coronavirus and specifically in their nursing homes. People want to know the answers about the coronavirus and the impact on nursing homes because there is a real problem there.
New York now admits that it gave the public false information. The numbers were not just wrong; they were nearly off by half. The Governor's top aide in New York said they were afraid of being investigated by Bill Barr's Justice Department. They were afraid that President Trump would make it a ``political football.''
Don't the people of New York have a right to know the truth about what is happening in the nursing homes in that State when people are losing parents and grandparents and when people with the coronavirus are being moved from the hospital back into those nursing homes to spread the disease to others?
The Governor of New York wanted to cover it up. People would agree it sounds like a coverup, so Senator Scott and I came to the floor and said that it was unacceptable, that States have to tell the truth. Every Republican voted yes. Every single Democrat voted no. Every Senate Democrat voted to protect Governor Cuomo instead of telling the truth to the American people.
During the budget debate, there were some good ideas that some Democrats supported. Yet, even then, in the wee hours of the morning, a number of the Democrats who had voted for those amendments flip-flopped on a later vote to head the other way. What they did is they had another amendment to strip out the amendments that had been put on.
For example, Senator Young of Indiana had an amendment so that money in the bill would go to American citizens, not to illegal immigrants. Eight Democrats voted in agreement with that. They said you shouldn't be sending checks to illegal immigrants. A few hours later, they voted to strip it out. So every Democrat in the Senate is now on the record. Every Democrat in the Senate has voted in favor of taking people's hard-earned taxpayer dollars and giving it to people who are in the country illegally.
Senator Daines brought up an amendment on a different topic. He said we should proceed with the Keystone Pipeline. Remember, President Biden, with an Executive order on the day he was inaugurated, stopped work on the Keystone Pipeline, resulting in the loss of hundreds and hundreds and likely thousands of jobs. Several Democrats voted and said we should reopen the pipeline. Let it go. Let it work. A few hours later, in the wee hours of the morning, they reversed themselves and voted to strip it out.
Senator Braun of Indiana introduced an amendment to prevent President Biden from banning fracking. Now, this is something that President Biden promised to do during the campaign. Of course, that would end millions of jobs across America, and it would put us at a disadvantage from the standpoint of energy. Seven Democrats voted with Senator Braun to protect American jobs. Hours later, they flip-flopped and took it out of the bill.
The Democrats keep trying to have it both ways. They want to look like moderates, pretend to be moderates, while still getting their leftwing spending bill through. They are not playing it straight with the American people. It is not going to work. The people in their States aren't going to be fooled. They are going to remember the votes, and they will certainly be reminded of those votes in the future.
So we have talked about what the Senate Democrats blocked. Now let's take a look at some of the things the Senate Democrats support.
The bill includes a mandate from Washington, DC, to double the minimum wage. It has nothing to do with the coronavirus. In fact, it would actually make things worse. The Congressional Budget Office took a look at this as to what the impact would be on the economy, and it said that 1.4 million people who have jobs right now would lose their jobs if the Federal Government were to come in with a mandate to double the minimum wage. It is not a stimulus.
According to one report, the new Washington mandate would also raise the cost of childcare by about 21 percent. How is that going to work for hard-working families who are trying to get back to work with the coronavirus and need daycare for their children? With schools closed in so many locations across the country, that is the last thing that working families need--an increase in the cost of providing care for their children.
The big Democratic spending bill also includes a $350 billion bailout for States and local governments. The money is especially targeted to States that have stayed closed the longest. This is money rewarding big cities and States like California and New York and Illinois that have had financial trouble due to financial mismanagement for many, many years. It has nothing to do with the coronavirus. Those States were in trouble long before the coronavirus made it to our shores.
Multiple studies show that State tax revenues are actually up in many States across the country. In some States, they fell, but on average, States are continuing to do quite well. Most States are expecting more tax revenues this year than they had before the pandemic. If a State needs a bailout, it is not because of the coronavirus; it is because of years and years of mismanagement, and this bill rewards mismanagement.
Those are the priorities of the Senate Democrats, not jobs and not opening our schools. The priorities are mandates and bailouts.
Only about $1 of every $20 in this entire proposal goes for public health, but it does contain $4.5 billion for Senator Schumer's New York City Subway system. It does provide $112 million for a subway system in Silicon Valley. It does provide $270 million in funding for the arts and humanities and $12 billion in foreign aid. This is supposed to be for the coronavirus in America, here.
So what does $1.9 trillion get for you? I am asked at home in Wyoming. What does it do for people at home--yes, the American taxpayer? Not much when you look at this Democratic shopping list. It is a wish list of liberal priorities.
As President Biden says, if you want to know somebody's values, look at one's budget. We have just done that. If the American people want to see the contrast between Republicans and Democrats, they should look no further than this bill. The Republicans are offering the American people jobs, a vaccine, and opening our schools. The Democrats are offering excuses and the liberal wish list.
We still have time to fix the final bill, so I would urge my Democratic colleagues to join with us. Work with the Republicans for real coronavirus relief. Help our small communities and small businesses keep their doors open. Get our kids back in school. Target the funding to the American citizens who need it the most. We have done five bipartisan coronavirus bills. A sixth coronavirus relief bill should be done in a bipartisan way as well. That is what the American people, with a 50-50 Senate, are asking us to do.
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