Debt Ceiling
Floor Speech
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Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, if the 118th Congress is going to do its job and raise the debt ceiling later this year, there is one very big, very important question that all of us need to answer: Republicans, where is your plan? It is the first question that must be asked, so let me ask it again. Republicans, where is your plan?
For weeks, we have heard lots of howling at the Moon from House Republicans on the MAGA fringe about sabotaging the credit of the United States but little in the way of actual solutions. Republicans in the House, especially the MAGA ones, seem disturbingly at ease with taking our economy hostage in exchange for gutting vital programs, but when asked to explain to the American people what kind of cuts they want, suddenly these Republicans seem stumped.
This is reckless. Few issues require more bipartisanship, more cooperation, and more serious-mindedness than protecting the full faith and credit of the United States. We have never failed to pay our debts on time, and the debt ceiling has consistently been a bipartisan endeavor. The radical MAGA crowd running the show in the House seems unable to grasp this truth.
So let me try it again. House Republicans, where is your plan? You want to gut Federal spending, so show us what that means. Show us what it means to the average American family in specific detail. It is your responsibility on such a weighty issue to do just that.
Speaker McCarthy. Speaker McCarthy has an obligation--an obligation-- to explain to the American people what Republicans actually plan to do about raising the debt ceiling. Until we get a clear answer from House Republicans about what their plan is, there is no point in speculating about anything else, because if Republicans really want to starve the American people of vital services, the American people have a right to know what that will mean for their daily lives. Otherwise, the American people will be left with only questions and no answers.
Republicans say they want cuts. Do Republicans want to cut Social Security and Medicare? Do Republicans want to cut military funding? Do they want to cut aid to veterans? Do they want to cut funding to police and firefighters and first responders? Do they want to cut education, public health, science and research?
Saber-rattling about the debt and grandiose statements without any specifics are not going to cut it. They have been doing that for a while. It doesn't work. Lay out the plan. Show us your plan. Republicans need to show us the math. They need to level with the American people. They need to show us their plan.
Now, here in the Senate, some Members from the MAGA faction-- particularly Senator Rick Scott--have taken it upon themselves to fill the void that House Republicans have created. The bad news is, the plan they came up with is about as unhinged as they come.
Yesterday, the junior Senator from Florida--the very same Senator who thought that tax hikes on middle-class families was a winning formula for Republicans last November--released a proposal that would put the interests of the Chinese Communist Party before the needs of American families. Senator Scott calls it the Full Faith and Credit Act, but it is legislation that does not even deserve partial credit.
Bondholders in Beijing would get their money, while Floridians, Alabamians, Wisconsinites, and so many other American citizens would be left out to dry. Does he want to pay China before he pays schoolteachers? Does he want to pay the Chinese Communist Party before he pays our police officers? There is no end to the negative impacts of this piece of legislation, and it is no substitute for real action to avoid default. Worse yet, reports suggest that Speaker McCarthy has promised MAGA radicals in the House that he will hold a vote on a similar proposal to this one.
Seriously, Mr. President, just when we thought we had seen the limits of MAGA extremism, Senator Scott has swooped in and reminded us that when it comes to MAGA insanity, there is no bottom. And who--who--is going to pay the price? The American people.
Now on the national sales tax--I mean, you can't make this stuff up, but it goes on and on and on, these really ludicrous, way out of line, way over to the extreme Republican plans. They keep coming at us. Another one they put out is a national sales tax.
While Republicans refuse to show what they plan to do about the debt ceiling, they spend a lot of time talking up one of the worst policy proposals in existence--a 30-percent national sales tax on all consumer goods. The House Republicans just can't seem to get out of their own way. House Republicans call it the Fair Tax Act, but let's call it what it really is--a disaster for middle-class families.
There is nothing fair about a tax that punishes average families for buying essential goods while giving the rich another chance to lower their tax burdens. That is what is behind most of these Republican plans--a desire to help the very wealthy. And if it comes out on the middle class and most Americans, they don't give a hoot. They don't give a hoot.
The Fair Tax Act is truly foul stuff. The Republican tax plan would raise the cost of buying a house by $125,000. It would raise the cost of buying a car by $10,000. It would raise your average grocery bill by $3,500 a year at a time when people are already worried about the high price of groceries. How can they do this? Things like eggs are already too expensive, but Republicans want to slap another $1.50 on that price. The plan would make a gallon of milk cost another $1.70 more.
The shock waves go way beyond trips to the grocery store, as painful as those have been. The Republican tax would erode the value of retirement plans, Social Security, pensions and 401(k)s by nearly one- third, an insulting way--insulting--to treat people who have spent their entire lives saving up in order to retire with some degree of dignity.
In all my years in office--in all my years in office--I have rarely seen such an extreme proposal be taken seriously by a governing majority. It is another reminder of how radical, how out of touch, how unserious MAGA Republicans are about governing. All they want to do is help their very ultrarich friends. And the fact that the House leadership is catering to the delusional whims of MAGA extremism should send a shiver down every one of our spines.
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