National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, after spending--this is on NDAA. After spending months insisting that the Senate should take swift action on our annual Defense bill, last night, Republicans mounted a partisan filibuster, blocking this Chamber from moving forward on the NDAA.

For the information of all, before the vote closed last night, I changed my vote to ``no'' and then entered a motion to reconsider the cloture vote so we could find a path forward on this important bill.

Now, we have heard over and over and over again from Republicans, in some form or another, that the Senate must act on NDAA and must act quickly. One Republican colleague called it a core duty, a bare minimum. Yet another colleague said it was ``the best way to thank our soldiers and sailors for their service.''

But, last evening, Republicans blocked legislation to support our troops, support their families, keep Americans safe, and support jobs across the entire country. Republican dysfunction has again derailed even bipartisan progress on our annual defense bill--an outrageous outcome that shows how the Senate and Republican leadership have changed in recent years.

Previous leaders, knowing that Democrats had offered Republicans a whole lot of amendments, would have said: ``Let's vote cloture''--but not this leader, not yet.

And there should be no mistake: The process that Democrats, and particularly my colleague Chairman Reed, have offered Republicans on NDAA has been more than fair and reasonable. For months, my colleagues in the Armed Services Committee have been working to produce a bipartisan product that could come to the floor for a vote.

The bipartisan Reed-Inhofe agreement--a Reed-Inhofe agreement--was what we brought to the floor yesterday to vote on.

During the markup, Members considered 321 amendments and adopted 143 bipartisan ones before reporting the bill out of committee by a vote of 23 to 3--23 to 3, bipartisan.

In preparation for the Senate floor, the managers worked on a substitute amendment, which had at least 50 amendments--27 of them, the majority, from Republicans. Senator Inhofe, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, worked with Democrats and had agreed to this.

And on top of all that, Senators Reed and Inhofe also reached a bipartisan agreement to hold votes on 19 amendments here on the floor before Republicans blocked that proposal 2 weeks ago.

Nineteen amendment votes--19--that is more than the total number of amendments to NDAA that received votes under the Republican majority and under Leader McConnell when we debated this bill in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020--not more than in each year, more than all of them put together.

We just had 2 amendments on NDAA in 2017, when McConnell was majority leader. We had 5 in 2018, when Mitch McConnell was majority leader; 3 in 2019; and 7 in 2020. Adding that up, that is a total of 17. That is over 4 years.

This year, we offered 19 amendment votes, including bipartisan measures to combat ransomware, repeal the 2020 Iraq AUMF, and support improved cyber defense of our critical infrastructure. But when we tried to get consent to move on this package of amendments, our Republican colleagues came down to the floor and objected not once but seven times.

So we have had ample debate. This has been a fair and reasonable process that has showed respect to the other side. But this is a new Republican Party, unfortunately, and it was not good enough for them even on the Defense bill.

Passing the annual Defense bill should not be in question, and Republicans' blocking this legislation is harmful to our troops, to their families who sacrifice so much, and to our efforts to keep Americans around the world safe.

Now, we Democrats are not going to let Republican intransigence stop us. We are going to keep working forward on a path forward, and we hope our Republican colleagues, as they discuss this among themselves, will see the light and come up with a fair proposal to allow this bill to go forward.

Nineteen amendments--a total of 17 on all the other NDAA bills--to say that we are being unfair, to say that we are not giving enough amendments is poppycock, and they know it.

Let's move forward. Let's move forward. Government Funding

Mr. President, now on government funding, there is another critical priority that the Senate must also address before the week's end: passing a continuing resolution that will keep the government funded beyond the December 3 deadline.

As soon as tomorrow, the House is expected to take action to pass a CR that will fund the government into next year. Senate Democrats are ready to pass this legislation and get it done as quickly as possible.

To avoid a needless shutdown, Republicans will have to cooperate and approve the government funding legislation without delay. If Republicans choose obstruction, there will be a shutdown entirely because of their own dysfunction.

We cannot afford to go down that road. As winter begins, the last thing Americans need right now is an avoidable, Republican-manufactured shutdown that will potentially harm millions of Federal workers, harm their families, and harm local communities that rely on an open and functioning Federal Government.

Democrats are going to work all week to make sure no government shutdown comes to pass, and we urge our Republican colleagues to work with us. Debt Limit

Mr. President, on debt limit, also, soon the Senate must take action to assure that the United States does not--does not--default on its sovereign debt for the first time in history. I recently had a good conversation with the Republican leader about this issue, and I expect to continue those talks on achieving a bipartisan solution to addressing the debt limit.

By now we know the dangers of an unprecedented default. Secretary Yellen has warned that failure to extend the debt ceiling would ``eviscerate'' our economic recovery and says our country could yet again slip into ``a deep recession.''

Both parties know that this is simply unacceptable, and so I look forward to achieving a bipartisan solution to addressing the debt limit soon. Build Back Better

Mr. President, finally, on Build Back Better, before we hit Christmas Day, it is my goal to have the Senate take action to debate and pass President Biden's Build Back Better legislation.

This week, Senate Democrats will focus on continuing to meet with the Parliamentarian so we can finish making the technical and procedural fixes necessary for reconciliation. Once that is complete, it will be time to bring Build Back Better here to the floor of the Senate.

I have said many times before that nobody should expect legislation of this magnitude to be easy. We have been at the task for several months, but we need to take a step back and recognize that we are, hopefully, less than a month away from acting on the largest investment the American people have seen in generations.

Here is what we are going to do in this bill: lower the cost of childcare, make pre-K universally accessible, cut taxes for parents and working and middle-class families, and take the next bold step in our fight against the climate crisis.

All this we want to tackle before the Christmas break. So we will keep working this week and until we get it done.

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