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Floor Speech

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Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I appreciate so much the comments of my colleague. I think this shows you that whether you are talking about Wyoming and the people who are there or Tennessee, my State, the economy is one of the top issues people are discussing.

Joe Biden addressed the Nation just over a year ago, and he had all of these bold claims about how he expected the economy to respond to his what I thought were reckless taxing-and-spending sprees. He made this statement, and I am going to quote him because he was trying to make the point that inflation was transitory, that it was going to be temporary. Here is what he said:

I want to be clear: my administration understands that were we ever to experience unchecked inflation in the long term, that would pose a real challenge for our economy. While we're confident that isn't what we're seeing today, we're going to remain vigilant about any response that is needed.

Well, let's fast-forward a year from that very bold, brash statement, and we know that it was a falsehood that was meant to distract ``we the people'' while the President and the Democrats worked overtime to make things worse.

Now, this week, economists expect to confirm what we have known for a long time and, as Senator Barrasso was saying, what people are feeling in their personal economy--that the U.S. economy isn't just struggling, it is shrinking. Buying power for households is shrinking. Options and choices are shrinking. If the numbers say what we think they will, we will see the second consecutive month of a shrinking GDP and another month of runaway inflation. Just a few hours ago, we learned that consumer confidence dropped again this month. Expectations are down again.

These are the warning signs of a recession. The White House doesn't want us to say it. The pundits don't want to say it. But that is the reality that Joe Biden has created. Do you know who is saying it? Thousands of Tennesseans because they are living it every day.

Now, I would suggest to my colleagues that if they find themselves questioning this reality, they should get out of the city and spend some time talking to people who live in their State--people who don't exist in the political bubble, the people who are having to make a choice between filling up the gas tank and filling up the grocery cart. Go talk to the farmers and the truckdrivers and the small business owners, and listen to them when they tell you how very difficult life is right now. Talk to the moms and the grandmoms in those smalltown grocery stores and listen to them when they tell you how hard it is to keep their household running.

One of the many reasons this is so frustrating for Tennesseans is that under President Trump, economic success was pretty much a given. The country was recovering from the pandemic. We had a plan to repair our supply chains. The American people were starting to have hope that the dystopian nightmare they had been living through was finally over.

But it is clear to them that if we ever find any sort of success under President Biden, it is going to come as a pleasant surprise because right now they are not seeing light at the end of the tunnel. Every week, it is harder, whether you are trying to find baby formula or you are trying to find basic staples or you are trying to make some of those pre-back-to-school purchases for your children.

I talk to people every day. They worry about what is coming next because they cannot believe how fast the change has come about under the Biden administration. One of the things they mention is that Joe Biden and the Democrats have eliminated predictability and replaced it with certainty that whatever this administration comes up with next is going to be something that makes their lives worse.

When I go home and I talk to my friends at church or at the store, people ask me: Why is this administration doing this? How could they possibly be making such terrible decisions?

The answer is really quite simple. They don't believe that the purpose of the Federal Government is to serve ``we the people''; they believe its purpose is to control our lives from the moment we get up in the morning until we put our head on the pillow at night, 24/7, 365. They have a long history of using their power to incentivize dependency on the government, but this administration has taken it even further.

What they perceive is happening is that they are being punished-- punishing families, small businesses, and local governments that speak out by forcing them to pay for a socialist agenda that picks winners and losers. And who loses? Families. Small businesses. Local governments. They lose every single time.

At every stop so far on my 95-county tour, county mayors and other local leaders have described to me how this agenda has made planning for the future virtually impossible. Those are their words, not mine: It is impossible. A few years ago, they were focused on improving their communities, and now they are just praying that they will be able to keep providing basic services.

Fuel is too expensive. Construction supplies are too expensive. And if they are available, utilities are breaking the budget.

In McNairy County, a 3-year supply chain delay on a new firetruck has frozen the flow of much needed grant funding. Local leaders were counting on that money to finish a few projects, get more first responders on the road, and lower the cost of living for the 30,000 people they are responsible for, but now they are stuck.

It is the same story for hundreds of small businesses and farms all across the State. We have farmers who decided not to put their crops in the ground this year because the cost of diesel, fertilizer, chemicals, and pesticides is just too high. Now think about that. The people responsible for maintaining our food supply are no longer able to supply food because this administration had other priorities. Retailers and other small business owners aren't faring any better. Because things are more expensive for them, they are more expensive for each and every one of us.

More and more often, Tennessee families are finding too much month left at the end of their paycheck rather than paycheck that is left at the end of the month. This has led to some hard choices, not just about the little luxuries they once enjoyed but about the essentials. Will they cook a balanced meal or will they pay the electric bill? Will they put gas in the car or do they need to send that money to school for their kids' lunch? No one should have to make these choices, but this is the reality for millions of families.

But President Biden and the Democrats aren't worried about that. It doesn't appear they have ever been. Once they took control of the Federal Government, they immediately started spending money on things that sounded great to their base but that the American people did not vote for and still simply do not want. They knew this would sabotage our economic recovery, it would drive inflation, but still they found plenty of money to start chipping away at their wish list.

They couldn't bring themselves to let America stay energy independent, so they canceled the Keystone Pipeline, and they sent the regulatory state after domestic energy producers. Indeed, 42 of the 69 regulations that this President has put in place have been focused on the energy sector.

Time and time again, President Biden and the Democrats have made it clear that their priorities do not align with the wants and needs of this country.

They gave a green light to the Green New Deal, to critical race theory in public schools, to an open border, and to force decimating vaccine mandates on the National Guard and the Reserves.

Meanwhile, the American economy has stopped dead in its tracks. This has to end. We are not just losing money; we are running out of time. The American people are beginning to feel this administration has abandoned them, that they are being punished. But they also want you to know that in spite of all that, they are not ready to submit to this agenda. They are concerned about their families and their communities. It is time to move away from this reckless, destructive agenda and choose the American people.

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