The Dangers Facing Our Country
Floor Speech
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Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Arizona for being willing to stand on the floor of the United States House of Representatives, when unfortunately so many of my colleagues are not, this evening to talk about the danger facing our country. And the gentleman outlines, I believe if I am correct, that we will be facing $112 trillion of debt come 2050, if we do not change course. If we do not take the steps necessary to make changes with respect to our healthcare spending and make wise policy choices--like any family, any budget that you have to maintain, if you are running a business, nonprofit, a university, virtually everybody in the world, or at least everybody in the country--except this body right here--that has to maintain and balance a budget and make determinations and make tough choices.
If the gentleman would indulge me for a minute or two, for a couple more minutes on the floor. When was the last time the gentleman recalls we have had the ability to amend a piece of legislation on the floor of this body? Truly amend it?
Does the gentleman remember?
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Mr. ROY. I yield to the gentleman.
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Mr. ROY. Would it surprise the gentleman that it was May of 2016, the last time that an amendment was offered on the floor of this body in open debate?
Now, to be clear, that is an assessment of leadership in both parties. But how on earth can we actually solve the problems, I would ask the Speaker, if we don't come down and sit at this table, stop looking up at the C-SPAN cameras and just sit around this table and start with a budget--like any family or any business--and say, Here is how much money we have. Here is how we can responsibly spend for the betterment of the people. Have disagreements about what those priorities are and make choices.
When was the last time that we have done that? It is a rhetorical question, but I know one data point is that May of 2016 was the last time that any Member of this body was able to walk on to this floor and offer an amendment that wasn't precooked up in the Committee on Rules previously and already set up by the leadership structure of either party.
Would the gentleman agree that that is no way for the people's House to operate?
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Mr. ROY. I yield to the gentleman.
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Mr. ROY. Well, the gentleman is completely correct, and there is no debate about that. You want to have a conversation about solving the Medicare crisis driving $112 trillion, then you have to have a conversation about solving the healthcare crisis. And to solve the healthcare crisis, you need to actually be willing, both sides of the aisle, to take on the army of lobbyists representing the insurance companies, the hospitals, pharmaceutical companies--all minting money right now, by the way, literally minting money--and you have got to be willing to have a conversation about that to actually figure out how we can transform our healthcare system to be patient-centered, doctor- centered, and not have to go to an insurance bureaucrat or a government bureaucrat to figure out what your healthcare looks like and then get competition, transparency, and drive down prices. Because if you drive down prices, we can actually solve the Medicare crisis.
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Mr. ROY. Well, I would agree with the gentleman. And to your point, you asked me a question about how many times we have had a real substantive debate. The closest I can remember was I made this point about amendments on the floor of the House. And the gentleman from Maryland, the leader, said in an agreement, Yeah, I wish we had more debate on the floor. And I would say to the leader, let's do it. Right? Let's start.
Let's drop a bill on the floor, instead of a 2000-page monstrosity that costs X-trillions of dollars that was passed by the Committee on Rules, was brought to the floor, that we then offer an MTR, and then we go and give press conferences about why we can't support it. That is no way to actually do the work of the people.
The NDAA bill last week, let's put a bill here on the table and then let's offer amendments. Right? We had a whole fight about, draft our daughters, about vaccine mandates, all these things. Well just start with the NDAA and then offer some amendments. Let the votes work. Let the people speak.
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Mr. ROY. I am, I am.
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Mr. ROY. It's shrinking.
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Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman. I appreciate your steadfast commitment to try and speak the truth and come down to the floor and speak to the American people, and unfortunately all too often, an empty Chamber.
I appreciate that my colleagues, many of whom were able to get a flight and go home--and God bless them--but we have problems to solve. And we ought to be here debating in this Chamber rather than posturing.
Mr. Speaker, I would note that previously my colleagues were eulogizing and remembering Senator Bob Dole. As we all know, he was a World War II veteran who was injured in combat; a man of great distinction who served in public life pretty much since his service in World War II. And he is a reminder, as we all know, of losing that generation. There are precious few remaining.
Both of my grandfathers have passed who served in World War II. We lost Senator Dole this week. I was on a flight to Austin, Texas, earlier this week, on Monday, with an honor flight, with eight veterans of World War II who came up for Pearl Harbor Day on December 7. None of those eight had been present at Pearl. Two of them were over 100 years old. One of the men, I sat next to him on the plane flying up to D.C., had served and been in combat in Iwo Jima. There is only a few of these folks left.
And what I want to spend a minute focusing on, as we are heading out, and I know we will be back next week for a day, but we are getting close to winding down and heading home for Christmas. I want to remember what that generation did.
Joe Crute and Jim Swartz remember vividly the merciless, frigid cold they survived during the Battle of the Bulge: ice, wind, snow, frozen ground, frostbite, amputations, pneumonia, Americans dying from hypothermia in a land far away from their homes.
Approximately 1 million Allied forces endured the inhospitable conditions during the fight that lasted from December 16, 1944, until January 25, 1945, a span which, of course, surrounded Christmas.
This was the Germans making their last major offensive strike on the Western Front during World War II. Almost 90,000 of them ended up wounded, missing, captured, or dead from battle injuries.
Seventy-seven years later--this was written 2 years ago-- when recalling the bitter conditions of the Battle of the Bulge, Swartz stared at his large hands, rubbing them together as if to warm them. I have something to show for it, he said when sharing his experiences. I have the results of that cold. My hands are almost to the place where they are useless from the frostbite.
You couldn't drink the water from the lakes due to the fact of dead animals and dead bodies in the water, so we had to purify that. Some of the boys couldn't get to the water. Some of them, the water was frozen in their canteens. So what did they do? They ate the snow to keep their body liquefied.
We attempted to make shelter in the ground, but to no avail. You tried to dig little holes in the ground to sleep. The ground was so hard you couldn't dig a hole. So what you did is you got pine branches off of the pine trees, laid them down on the ground and laid there and covered yourself up with half of your pup tent. That is how you tried to keep warm.
One day, a fellow soldier was mortally wounded. He was a little bit bigger than I was, Crute said. He was shot in the back. I ran and got his mackinaw off. It fit him perfect, but when I put it on it was an overcoat. It felt good. I pitied the poor guy, but it was so cold.
At that time in 1944, there is the famous exchange that happened when the German commander wrote our commander, General McAuliffe, basically saying battalions are ready to annihilate the United States troops in and near Bastogne. The order for firing will be given immediately after this 2 hours term. General McAuliffe replied, famously, ``nuts,'' and they fought on. They battled on.
Many of the soldiers spent Christmas 1944 celebrating the best they could. The American soldiers were within Bastogne. Christmas services were held by the Army chaplain. Some in the country went and visited with others. One story:
We were out in the outskirts of Bastogne and we found this farmhouse. Inside was a man and a woman and a little boy and a little girl. The wife, she gave us some soup and some black bread. We stayed there all night in this farmhouse. The war was going on fiercely outside, and for some reason the farmhouse never got hit.
We were there Christmas Eve. We sang Christmas songs that night with this Belgian family. We sang Jingle Bells and Silent Night. The words were different, but the music was the same.
The thing that strikes me as we think about that generation and think about what they did in World War II in response to Pearl Harbor, signing up and enlisting and going out into the Pacific and going into Europe to stand up against tyranny around the globe and defend our country, but also others around the world, for an idea and for something bigger than they.
They signed up without a question. Churchill famously observed that once we were bombed by the Japanese on that December day in 1941 that caused then-President Roosevelt to come into this room and give that famous speech about that day that will live in infamy--Churchill observed that the war would be won.
The sleeping giant had been awakened because the world knew who we were. The world knew what America stood for. It knew that that sleeping giant had been awakened. Nothing could be assumed. It took a massive ramp-up, massive sacrifice, rationing, women enlisting, Rosie the Riveter, men enlisting, going across, 400,000 dead, represented on those stars at that memorial here on The Mall.
The world knew what we would do. The question I would ask my colleagues today: Does the world know what we would do today? Does the world know who we are? Does the world know what we will do as we watch China on the rise, Russia rattling against Ukraine, Iran rattling about nuclear capability in an unstable Middle East, threatening our friend and ally Israel?
The cartels in violence and unrest on our southern border--does the world know whether we have the resolve to stand up in defense of the rule of law and in defense of freedom and against tyranny around the globe but with the resolve necessary to win it?
When President Reagan stood athwart the Soviet Union and talked about peace through strength and told Mr. Gorbachev to tear down these walls, the world knew our resolve. Do they today? Can we accomplish the objectives of defending this country and standing up in the world when we refuse to do the basic job of managing our own affairs and our own country responsibly?
We amassed a mountain of debt in World War II: 125 percent of GDP by 1946 coming out of the Depression. We got back and got busy growing our economy. We grew out of it and got that down. We are sitting here today in relative peacetime with $30 trillion in debt, barreling toward $112 trillion in debt as my colleague just articulately illustrated on the floor of the House to an empty Chamber, minus myself and the Speaker. We are doing nothing about it. Nothing. Literally.
Just last night, there was wailing and gnashing of teeth among my colleagues because we dared force votes on 30 suspension votes. Oh, no, we might miss a Christmas dinner or a Christmas party. Oh, no, we might not catch our flight home early enough.
Madam Speaker, $2.7 billion was authorized last night in suspension votes, all bills that often just sound good in the headlines. Three of us voted against a bill that would provide $500 million over 5 years to support research and funding for therapies for ALS. I was one of those three ``no'' votes.
Do you think I want to go back and talk to people and families that are afflicted by ALS? Where are the rest of my colleagues in explaining where that $500 million is going to come from? When we are faced with a conflict like our forefathers were facing, when Pearl Harbor was bombed, when Hitler was on the march, and we resolved to fight, we could because our economy was strong enough, and we were disciplined enough to try to do the right thing. Are we able to do that today when we are not even disciplined enough to sit here and figure out how to manage the budget and the spending of the United States so we don't drive our country into complete and total bankruptcy and destroy it for our kids and our grandkids?
Literally, everybody, both sides of the aisle, say, well, it is just some votes. Some people today were giving me trouble because one of those suspension votes might be used as a political weapon by one of my Democratic opponents or one of our Democratic colleagues because they managed to pass some bill with a 375-40 bipartisan vote.
Oh, no, don't give somebody a political weapon so they can go run an ad. Nowhere was there concern about another $2 billion or $3 billion just passed through on suspension bills that we hardly debated.
When we talk about and venerate men like Bob Dole and men serving in World War II, and we look at our grandfathers and our great- grandfathers who sat there in the frigid cold or stormed Iwo Jima or stormed the cliffs at Normandy, can we fight those fights tomorrow? Are we capable of it? Do we have the resources to do it, much less the resolve, if we can't even resolve in this body to preserve and protect the actual foundation of this country to be economically and financially firm and stable?
If we don't resolve, the 435 Members of this body, to do the hard work, as my colleague from Arizona was pointing out, of making tough decisions about Medicare and Social Security and mandatory spending, but also the discretionary spending that I talked about last night, but also the National Defense Authorization Act that we just threw $25 billion at the Defense Department with no real reforms or changes to how they spend money, how are we ever going to save this Republic?
I said last week in a speech that this is the United States House of free stuff because that is what it has become. It has become an entity that doles out money to whatever cause because it sounds good and feels good.
There was $500 million for ALS research. God bless them. I am glad that research is going to occur. But someone has to sit on the floor of the House, and say: Where are we going to get the money? Not just print it.
I can't go next door to my neighbor and knock on the door, and say: Hey, it is time for you to give me your check. What check? Well, the check for ALS. Well, what do you mean? Well, it is a good cause. The check for cancer, I am a cancer survivor. The check for polio, my dad is a polio survivor--whatever it might be.
Not one of us in this Chamber has the right to knock on our neighbor's door, and say: Give me a check to go give to another thing. You wouldn't do that. But through the power of this body as a whole we print money, borrow money, and then dole it out for political benefit and nothing more. It is cowardly. It is embarrassing. It is destroying the Republic.
Thread by thread, the flag is getting tattered because we refuse to do the hard work, as my friend from Arizona said, of making tough decisions to ensure that we can sustain this Republic.
We will come back in next week and the debt ceiling will get raised. That is as true as the Sun coming up in the east. Not a thing will be done to right the ship of the massive amount of debt piling up around the ears of our kids and our grandkids. Nothing will be done next week to solve that problem.
Republicans will blame Democrats using a crazy procedural ploy in the Senate, passing a bill to blow up the filibuster to allow the debt ceiling on a supposed one-time basis to be raised with a 51-vote threshold so that they can go back to the American people, and say: I didn't vote to raise the debt ceiling, but you did.
Don't let them hide. They did. They concocted the scheme. They voted to make sure that that happened, and the debt ceiling will be raised. Not a thing will change about how we carry out our work. Nothing will be done to make this country fiscally sound again.
Madam Speaker, may I ask how much time I have left.
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Mr. ROY. Madam Speaker, let me take a minute to thank the staff, the floor staff. We come down here and speak into late hours. We have votes like last night that go until 9 p.m. or 10 p.m. because some of us forced some votes. I appreciate all of your hard work. As a former staffer, I know it is not easy.
The American people are a great people. The American people want this body, the Senate, and their leadership in Washington to actually represent them again. I am going to keep giving this speech over and over again, and I am going to keep calling for this body to do the hard work of representation. We don't govern; we represent.
Those men who sat in the freezing cold--frostbite, amputations, pneumonia, death, and picking up jackets off of their fallen compatriot to stay warm to defeat Hitler's Germany-- those men who responded to Pearl Harbor 80 years ago this week, and President Washington overlooking this Chamber here in that portrait crossing the Delaware Christmas Eve night 1776, what will we do to honor their memories?
What will we do to carry forward this Republic for which they fought, died, bled, and lost limbs? Senator Dole carrying a pen in his crippled hand, what will we do to honor that sacrifice?
That is our calling as we embark on the second half of this Congress. I don't accept that just because my party is not in control of this Chamber for the next year that we can't find a way to actually do the hard work of representation.
My ask of the Speaker, the leader, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, and my colleagues on this side of the aisle: restore regular order on this floor. Bring bills to the floor and allow us to vote, debate, amend, and do the work the American people expect us to do.
It is the least that we can do to honor the memory of those World War II veterans whom we are losing by the day, all of those who have sacrificed to defend this country, and all of those who sat there on that Christmas Eve day in Bastogne singing Christmas carols hoping to get back to this great country.
Let's fight to save that great country.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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