Inflation

Floor Speech

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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to talk about inflation. And one thing is sure, Joe Biden is the President of high prices.

New numbers are out today. This morning, we found that inflation remains the worst it has been in 40 years--40 years. Now, we knew that today's inflation numbers were going to be bad for Americans and bad for the administration, but the numbers today are worse than people thought.

Prices rose nearly 8 percent in just the last year. That means we are now seeing more inflation in the last 13 months under President Joe Biden than we did in the previous 4 years. And families are suffering. Prices are going up, but wages are not keeping up. Last week, we found out that wages, in terms of an escalation, had slowed down a bit, which means that people are falling further and further behind. Wages just cannot keep up with the prices that continue to go up. Month after month after month, the American people have found themselves falling further and further and further behind.

I remember when Joe Biden told all of us that inflation would be ``transitory.'' He kind of laughed about it. He said it over and over again. And then, in December, he said inflation had ``peaked.'' Mr. President, inflation had not peaked. Joe Biden, once again, dead wrong.

Now, the American people are reminded about this every time they go to the gas station, every time they go to the grocery store, every time they go out to purchase goods.

So why is this happening? What has happened to America under Joe Biden and the mismanagement of this Democratic administration that has the House, the Senate, and the White House?

Well, there are two main things. One is Democrats' spending, excessive spending. The other, of course: Democrats' restrictions on American energy.

One year ago, Joe Biden signed the largest spending bill in American history. Democrats put $2 trillion on America's credit card. They flooded the country with government cash, and prices went up. And ever since that day, prices have been going up faster than wages. There is still no end in sight. The painful truth of all of this is energy prices, food prices all across the country are going to continue to go up thanks to the mismanagement of Joe Biden and this administration.

Today, a gallon of gas in the United States is the highest it has ever been--ever. When Joe Biden took office, the average price of gasoline in America was $2.38 a gallon; and today, it is about $2 a gallon more than it was then. Coming from my home State of Wyoming, where people drive more miles per capita than any other State in the country, people in my State are really feeling the pain of the mismanagement by Joe Biden and the Democrats.

If we think it is bad in Wyoming, let's go to the liberal paradise of California. I don't know what it is in the Presiding Officer's home State of Hawaii, but in California, it is $5.60 a gallon. Summer is coming, and people are expecting the prices to get even higher.

So what is Joe Biden's answer to this? He is blaming everything on Vladimir Putin--everything. It is a convenient excuse. It is just wrong. By the time that Vladimir Putin started to encircle Ukraine and then actually invaded Ukraine, inflation had been roaring here at home for over 10 months. Gas prices were already way up, $1.25 a gallon higher than they were on the day Joe Biden took office. So Biden's numbers just don't add up.

Russian oil amounts to about 3 percent of our energy use in the United States. Gas prices haven't just gone up by 3 percent. No, no. They have nearly doubled during Joe Biden's Presidency.

The real reason that prices are up so much for energy is Joe Biden has restricted our use of American energy. If you listen to his--go back to the tapes on the debate stage when he was running for President. He said he is going to keep it in the ground, no oil and gas or exploration or coal on public lands--none, zero. The White House Press Secretary the other day said, Oh, we are at record high production.

We are not. Mistake. Absolutely wrong. She should be fact-checked. We are over a million barrels a day fewer U.S. barrels of oil produced today than we were during the height of our production before the pandemic--actually, 1.4 million barrels a day fewer barrels today than we were at the height of our production before the pandemic.

Well, when supply goes down as a result of the mismanagement and the decisions made by this Biden administration and the refusal to allow for permits to explore for energy, prices go up; and they have. When the price of energy goes up, the prices of everything go up as well.

What are the Democrats proposing about high prices for energy? Well, the answer for Democrats seems to be anything except more American energy. Democrats have essentially floated three proposals: One is defund our roads and bridges; the second is buy more energy from our enemies, people that chant ``Death to America''; or keep prices high. Those are the options we hear from the Democrats.

We see some frightened Democrats worried about reelection talking about suspending the gas tax and then bringing it back right after election day. Well, the gas tax is what pays for the roads and the bridges, the highways of our Nation, but bring it back right after the election. Well, does that mean we are going to need less energy after election day; so it is OK to raise prices after the election? Of course not.

Even former Clinton and Obama economic adviser Larry Summers calls this proposal being introduced in this body by Members of the Democratic side of the aisle--he called it ``short-sighted, ineffective, gimmicky, and goofy.'' That is Larry Summers from both the Obama as well as the Clinton administration.

If we completely repeal the gas tax, gas prices would still be $1.75 more a gallon than they were the day Joe Biden took office. So another option the Democrats are floating is, ``Hey, let's buy more energy from our enemy.'' Wouldn't that be a great idea, says the President? So officials from the Biden administration have gone hat in hand to Venezuela last weekend as well as to Iran. Venezuela is one of the closest allies to Vladimir Putin. I understand the current man in power in Venezuela actually called to congratulate Vladimir Putin for what he is doing in Ukraine--so is Iran, in terms of the world's No. 1 sponsor of terrorism. That is who Joe Biden has chosen to talk to--Iran and Venezuela--rather than United States energy producers.

Do we want to pay our worst enemies over $100 a barrel for each barrel of oil they will sell to us? Do we want to send billions and billions of dollars of hard-earned taxpayer dollars in this country to those who hate us and burn American flags and chant ``Death to America,'' or do we want to create jobs here at home, produce more American energy? The answer is obvious to most American people. It may not be obvious to the man in the White House or his administration or those around him, but Joe Biden would rather have an enormous transfer of wealth to our enemies than tell the climate elitists who he dances to the tune of that we are going to produce energy at home.

Finally, some Democrats are just proposing: Let's keep energy prices high. The Secretary of Transportation says: Just buy an electric vehicle; that will solve all our problems. He said, You won't have to worry about gas prices no matter how high they go. It is OK if they go high as long as you buy an electric vehicle.

Talk about being out of touch. The average electric vehicle costs over $55,000. Families who are struggling in this Biden economy, they can't afford to spend $55,000. We have many, many Americans living paycheck to paycheck, falling further and further behind.

And the Secretary of Transportation says: Hey, just go find $55,000, buy an electric vehicle, and you can plug it in. Where do you think the electricity comes from? It doesn't come from the wall. Talk about an administration being out of touch. That is what we are dealing with in this country today. Two-thirds of Americans say they are living paycheck to paycheck.

This morning, we had a hearing in the Energy Committee that said, What about everybody trying to buy an electric vehicle; can we do it?

What do we hear? You have to buy a lot of things from China or Russia just to get the rare Earth minerals that are needed to build the batteries for the electric cars. What does Elon Musk, Mr. Tesla, say? He says, Produce more American energy.

It is time for the President of the United States to wake up. It is really not an option for everybody to get an electric vehicle. Even if everybody had the money, there are not enough electric vehicles to be had anywhere in the near--not just the near future--the foreseeable future and beyond that.

Another option is not to send billions of dollars to our enemies. After all, as a State Department official from this administration told us in the Foreign Relations Committee as Putin was building up--before the invasion, but building up the army around Ukraine--said that Putin's energy was the cash cow that was paying for his military aggression.

The American people deserve better solutions, rational solutions, solutions that they understand. And they understand American energy.

Just yesterday, Joe Biden said: I can't do much right now to bring down prices.

It is not true. Last week, the morning after the State of the Union address, I, along with every Republican on the Senate Energy Committee--every Republican signed the letter, sent it to Joe Biden, offered 10 points he could do and do now to make a difference for American energy production to help the American economy, to help with jobs, to help with energy production, and to help bring down the cost of energy.

We know what we need to do. To bring down inflation, we need to stop the reckless spending here in Washington, DC. Of course, that is gone now. The Democrats, on a single party-line vote--no Republican voted for it--did that last year to spark inflation and then all the rules and regulations and limitations on Americans' use of energy has added to and contributed to, today, a 40-year high of inflation.

Above all, we need to unleash American energy. We need to use American energy. More American energy will bring down the prices. We have it. When the Secretary of the Interior makes a statement that she wants us to keep all the oil and gas in the ground, that is a statement about this administration's lack of commitment to use American energy.

We have the opportunity in America to do it right. For more than a year now, the American people have been paying and paying and paying for the Democrats' anti-American energy policies, and they are sick and tired of it. You turn on the TV, and you see what is happening out there in the world. In Ukraine, people are getting killed by Vladimir Putin--a maternity ward and a hospital bombed, people killed. And what did former Secretary of State, John Kerry, the Democrats' climate envoy say in an interview to the BBC as the Russian troops encircled Ukraine? He said: I hope it doesn't distract from our climate agenda. That is obscene, and it is absurd.

The American people realize how absolutely ridiculous the position and how untenable the position of this administration is when you have the No. 1 climate spokesman for the administration, a former Secretary of State, somebody who was a Member of this body for years, close colleague and friend of the President of the United States--it is time for Joe Biden to stand up to John Kerry and to stand up to the climate elitists who say: Oh, no, no American energy because we are so pure.

The American people know what is important to them and their lives. We all want to make energy as clean as we can, as fast as we can, without raising costs on American families. The administration seems to be happy to see the prices go up on American families at a time when their wages are not keeping up with their expenses. It is long past time that we produce American energy and do it right here. We have the resources. We have the know-how. We have the workers. We are only missing one thing, and that is competent leadership in the White House and in the Democrats in this body on Capitol Hill.

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