Chaos, Confusion, and Manufactured Crises

Floor Speech

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Mr. SOTO. Mr. Speaker, I thank my dear friend from Illinois (Mr. Schneider) for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, you may have heard this, but inflation was one of the biggest issues in this last election.

Let me take you a little way back here. We saw during the height of the pandemic that it caused global inflation. Supply chains broke down, production broke down, and every country felt it, even the U.S. Inflation at one point rose as high as 9 percent. Over many months and many years and through efforts to boost productions, improve supply chains, and improve our infrastructure to get back to normal, we saw it go down to as low as 2.4 percent in September of 2024. Groceries and housing specifically have been a challenge.

When President Trump took office, inflation was still under 3 percent. It was still under 3 percent. Hundreds of executive orders have been signed. Some divisive and some illegal, but few, if any, address lowering costs for the American people. Many may have even increased costs.

First, the tariffs caused chaos against our own allies. President Trump admitted that this may cause some pain for Americans. Don't we remember he ran on lowering costs?

Maybe that was just a joke to get elected, because now suddenly we are going to have to accept some pain because of tariffs that he is trying to impose on the American people. Tariffs equal inflation. Tariffs equal taxes on American consumers.

Regarding immigration, we had a workforce shortage for many years, and then over time through legal programs like temporary protected status and parole in other areas, booming States like Florida, and particularly central Florida, south Florida, and Tampa Bay, benefited by these legal programs.

Mr. Speaker, when you look at housing, of which there is a huge shortage, 34 percent of the industry relies on immigrant labor. That is after trying to get every American we can to work to help build housing. Also with commercial real estate it is the same thing.

So what do we see? Food prices already are starting to creep back up. With housing prices it is the same deal. Eggs, gosh, remember: I can't afford eggs, bro.

That was like a huge deal during the election. We saw eggs down to about $2 only a couple of months ago. Now they are $7 and almost $8. Back in the day it was: Oh, it is President Biden. Now we have MAGA supporters going into intimate detail on the bird flu. That is funny. The last time that happened that wasn't the explanation at all. It was: Oh, Biden this and that. Now it is science and thoughtful answers to explain inflation that is happening under President Trump.

This was the craziest thing, Mr. Speaker. Apparently, it is dishonoring folks for us to even talk about how these policies will raise costs right up again that went down to as low as 2.4 percent a few months ago, still under 3 percent when President Trump was sworn in. However, it could get worse if the Trump tax scam 2.0 gets passed.

The Inflation Reduction Act allowed for a cap of $2,000 a year for prescription drug savings for all seniors under Medicare. Mr. Speaker, $3,500 was the cap last year. There was no cap before that, and most seniors were paying 3, 4, $5,000 or more in out-of-pocket expenses.

Now seniors won't pay more than $2,000 a year for their prescription drugs. However, if we see the majority take a sledgehammer to the IRA, then that savings goes away for seniors across the Nation just when they got it. That savings lowering costs for our seniors could go away.

Regarding the ObamaCare subsidies, oh, my gosh, have we not seen the majority learn, have Republicans not learned from now?

First of all, there is no plan, and there is no alternative. It has been over 10 years. By the way, since then, we have seen States like Florida have the largest ObamaCare exchange in the Nation. Mr. Speaker, 4.6 million Floridians from President Trump's home State, more than any other State in the Union, get their healthcare through the ACA exchange.

Do you know what happens if the ObamaCare subsidies go away, Mr. Speaker?

A family of four will see their healthcare increase by 8 to $10,000 a year. That is a lot of eggs. That is a lot of costs that people are going to have to shoulder. That will cripple families.

Do you know what is also going to happen, Mr. Speaker? We will have more people without health insurance, and then it is going to cost taxpayers in the emergency room. This is not how you make America healthy again, Mr. Speaker. It is how you make America sicker.

Why would anybody want to eliminate these healthcare savings? What could possibly be so important? Mr. Speaker, can you believe it is to cut taxes for billionaires? My constituents will see an $8,000 to $10,000 increase in their health insurance. Seniors across the Nation who have a $2,000 cap on prescription drugs--little old ladies who are trying to pay out of their pockets for prescription drugs, our seniors, our men and our women--are going to have to forgo those savings because the top 1 percent and the top 0.1 percent need more tax cuts.

Are they serious? Is this what people voted for? Heck no.

The last time we saw that happen, we saw this Chamber flip quicker than you could possibly imagine. It was sad. It didn't have to be that way.

The record is clear: President Trump inherited a strong economy from President Biden. I am going to repeat that. President Trump inherited a strong economy from President Biden: High growth, big job numbers, and inflation below 3 percent, 2.9 percent to be exact as of the end of January.

Here is a simple measure we will see over the next couple of months: Will costs go up or will they go down? Will grocery prices go up or will they go down? Will housing prices go up or will they go down?

Democrats stand ready to work in a bipartisan manner to keep our economy running strong. This is the second closest House in the history of the Nation. There are three votes separating Democrats from Republicans in this Chamber. Actually one vote right now because of the folks who had to go on to the Trump administration. So we can easily work together to resolve these things or my friends will go it alone in some big reconciliation package for billionaires and then we will see what happens in these very easily tracked measures.

Most of all, people will see it when they want to buy a home, when they want to go to the grocery store, and when they want to go on vacation down to Orlando, which we welcome everyone to come to, or when they want to buy a new car.

All these things Americans are going to be watching. We need to work together.

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