Relating to the Disapproval of the Presidential Report with Respect to the Indebtedness of the Government of Ukraine--Motion to Proceed
Floor Speech
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Mr. PAUL. 566, S.J. Res. 117.
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Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, here we go again with the ``Ukraine First, America Last'' policy. Earlier this week, President Biden delivered a report to Congress informing us that he now intends to forgive or cancel $4.65 billion worth of U.S. loans to Ukraine.
Now, you might ask yourself: When were these loans issued?
Oh, about a month or two ago.
Well, when does Ukraine have to pay back these loans that we are forgiving?
Well, they made an agreement to start paying them back in 40 years. President Biden is forgiving loans that aren't due for 40 years.
This makes a mockery of the entire charade that this is a loan. They should have just said it was a gift.
A forgivable loan? It is not even a loan. It is not due for 40 years, and we are forgiving it now.
These funds were provided by the American taxpayer in the form of loans with the expectation that they would be repaid. We are not going to wait any period of time. They weren't even going to be repaid for 40 years, and we are forgiving them. That is a sick joke, and a sick joke on every American who has got a loan at the bank for their house, who has to pay their mortgage every month, and yet Ukraine is never going to have to pay their loans.
It seems like this is ``Ukraine First, America Last.'' We have got a $36 trillion debt in our country. We are paying a trillion dollars in interest. We can barely keep up. We are not keeping up with all of the things we promised Americans: Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, food stamps--all of the things that have been promised. We are $2 trillion short.
So what do we do? We are just shipping billions to Ukraine. About $200 billion has been sent so far.
Such blatant disregard of American citizens is unacceptable. The joint resolution of disapproval that I put forward, today, provides the Senate an opportunity to prevent the President from doing this--from canceling this debt, from making a mockery of the idea that it was ever a loan.
We will not stand idly by as the President elevates the interests of a foreign country above our own.
And let me remind President Biden that, due to his failed policies over the last 4 years, Americans across this country are struggling with their loans. Today, some 37 million Americans live under the poverty line, including 9 million children. Fifty percent of Americans say they are living paycheck to paycheck, and yet the concern is for the loans of a foreign country that will never be repaid, that were not even going to begin to be repaid for 40 years.
This is an insult to every American who has a mortgage that they have to pay. Eight out of 10 Americans who earn less than $50,000 a year are unable to cover their future bills until their next paycheck arrives. Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, and we are shipping this money to a foreign country that will never be asked to repay it.
In 40 years, if they were somehow gloriously successful again--40 years from now--they are still not going to be asked to pay this. Americans are working two, sometimes three jobs just to make ends meet, and while millions of Americans work day in and day out to pay off their own personal loans, President Biden wants to forgive Ukraine's economic loans without any debate.
This was rushed forward. I was fortunate enough to get 16 colleagues to allow this vote to happen. But they didn't want this vote to happen. They gave us a short window, and, boom, it is going to be gone. They don't want a discussion about how obviously insulting this is to every American to do this.
The American people have been more than generous when it comes to supporting Ukraine. In the nearly 3 years of this war, Congress has appropriated nearly $200 billion in aid. For 3 years, the American people have been sold the lie that if we only send tens of billions more of their dollars to Ukraine, Ukraine will be able to push Russians out, secure the 2014 borders, and achieve victory in the battlefield.
It won't happen. The President of Ukraine, the generals of Ukraine, the people who have followed this situation all agree: The war is at a stalemate.
Trillions of dollars more will only lead to more carnage in the battlefield, and it won't achieve victory. These assertions were always farcical, as they failed to contend with basic battlefield realities.
Despite massive assistance provided by the United States and others, Ukraine is no better off now than they were 3 years ago. It is arguable that their ability to negotiate, as they have lost more land to Russia, is actually that their leverage for negotiation with Russia is less than it was when the war began.
In fact, Ukraine is now in a worse negotiating position because they have likely incurred hundreds of thousands of casualties and now face a critical manpower shortage. That shortage is becoming impossible to ignore, as Russia consolidates its gains and continues to make progress across eastern Ukraine.
Americans may be surprised to discover that their aid has not, in fact, shifted the war in Ukraine's favor. They may also be surprised to learn that much of the money Congress sends to Ukraine isn't actually being used to support Ukraine's military.
While American families struggle to put food on the table and keep the lights on, U.S. taxpayers are paying for the salaries of thousands of Ukrainian bureaucrats, their pensions. We are paying for their teachers.
Do our teachers make enough money? Probably not. But I am guessing, if you ask an American teacher, should we be paying the salaries of Ukrainian teachers, you might get a debate.
We are paying their healthcare workers' salaries, their first responders. We are buying seeds and fertilizer for their farmers. And we are bankrolling Ukrainian small businesses.
A report conducted earlier this year found that 43 percent of small businesses in America were unable to pay their rent in full and on time in the month of April. Yet we are sending billions of dollars to Ukraine to subsidize their small businesses.
A report by CBS News discovered that U.S. taxpayers are helping a Ukrainian knitwear company find new international customers overseas. Oh boy, we are helping Ukrainian businesses expand overseas.
We don't even need independent journalists to highlight such absurdities. USAID bragged on their own website about how they provided funding for six Ukrainian fashion brands to participate in Paris Fashion Week. I am sure they will be glad that they won't be paying back any loans.
This is what we are asking the American people to pay for--to send Ukrainian fashion brands to a Paris fashion show? I have never had one constituent in Kentucky come up to me and say: Please, send more money. We are fine in Appalachia. We are fine in rural Kentucky.
I don't think there is anybody in Asheville, NC, today that is pleading for more good money to be sent to Ukraine.
It is bad enough, but it is also impossible to ensure that this amount of money actually gets to the misguided priorities that have been set. The Government Accountability Office admits that there are a number of ways in which Federal Agencies could improve oversight and aid to Ukraine.
It has been 3 years. Why hasn't the government approved the oversight? Well, because it is impossible to send so much aid to a country as quickly as we have and expect that there won't be waste, fraud, and abuse.
I forced the Senate to vote on a special inspector general for Ukraine, and the ``Ukraine First uniparty''--both sides of the aisle-- voted it down. Even with a special inspector general, it is nearly impossible to ensure oversight on this vast amount of money in such a short period of time.
Adding insult to injury, Ukraine is consistently ranked as one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Transparency International ranked Ukraine 104th out of 180 countries in 2023, with respect to honesty and integrity, and also found that 23 percent of the public service users paid a bribe in the previous 12 months in Ukraine.
And yet we give billions of dollars, and we have no special inspector general.
And now in spite of all of this, President Biden wants to forgive over $4.6 billion in loans that the U.S. taxpayer provided under the auspices that they would be repaid.
This lunacy is just another example of how the Washington establishment is completely out of touch with Americans. You ask Americans about this, they have got to pay their loans; they don't understand forgiving Ukrainian loans.
The election earlier this month made it eminently clear that the American people are sick and tired of the status quo. They are sick and tired of business as usual in Washington, and they want their elected officials to deliver change.
It is fitting that in the final months of this disastrous Presidency, Joe Biden caps off his foreign policy for the middle class by asking to cancel over 4.6 billion in aid, in loans, to Ukraine--once again prioritizing the interest of a foreign country at the expense of our own.
I urge my colleagues to vote in support of this resolution to disapprove of the President forgiving this billions of dollars' worth of loans to Ukraine and put the American people first.
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Mr. PAUL. Sometimes in Washington, memories get clouded and foggy, even after a week. The Senator from North Carolina will remember that he objected to aid in North Carolina. He objected to small business loans. He objected to them simply because they were paid for.
I offered unanimous consent, and it was blocked by the Senator from North Carolina. I offered unanimous consent to immediately infuse more loans through the Small Business Administration for North Carolina that was hit hard by the flooding. The Senator from North Carolina blocked his own bill because I proposed that it be paid for by taking green energy boondoggle loans.
So don't be tricked by any flimflammery or any sort of making up of history. The Senator from North Carolina last week blocked his own aid passage that I agreed to let go unanimously as long as it was paid for by taking some extra money from another part of the budget. Don't be fooled.
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Mr. PAUL. It is very important that the truth be told about what went on with aid to North Carolina. I agreed to pass it unanimously as long as it was paid for.
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Mr. PAUL. I won't be interrupted, Mr. President. I have the floor.
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Mr. PAUL. I have the floor.
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Mr. PAUL. I will not yield the floor.
Mr. President--
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Mr. PAUL.--what has been said here is untrue.
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Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, it is important that the truth be told and that people aren't allowed to stand and lie without challenge.
The bill last week to give immediate aid to North Carolina was objected to by the Senator from North Carolina. I agreed to let it go immediately by unanimous consent as long as it was paid for. The Senator from North Carolina objected.
These are the facts. This is the Senate record. The people of North Carolina can read this in the Senate record. He objected to his own bill because he was annoyed that I had the audacity to say we have a $2 trillion debt, and we should pay for things.
We had $4 trillion worth of Green Energy New Deal boondoggle spending subsidies to big green energy company, big corporations. He objected to taking money from green energy boondoggle budgets and spending it in his own State. He objected to his own bill.
So what I would say is: The truth is important. The facts are important. We have had a very important debate here, and there is a general philosophical debate about whether or not we should spend money in Ukraine or in our country.
We have had flooding problems in Kentucky. I haven't met one person who suffered from this who didn't say it was more important to spend the money in Kentucky than Ukraine. It is a debate that is worth having. The decisions we make over here should be about prioritizing spending. Where do we spend it? Do we borrow it? Where do we spend the money? This is what it is about.
And the fact that the Senator from North Carolina wants to rewrite history and say he didn't object to his own bill when he did is a lie; just simply untrue. Just simply untrue.
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Mr. PAUL. Thank you. I would regain the rest of my time. How much time do I have left?
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Mr. PAUL. You said 6\1/2\ minutes?
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Mr. PAUL. This side of the debate which has--
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Mr. PAUL.--30 minutes will relinquish the remaining time on our side.
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Mr. PAUL. There is no more time left on our side.
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Mr. PAUL. There is none.
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Mr. PAUL. But that is not what happened. I relinquished the time.
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