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Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, over the last month, it has become clear how Donald Trump and Republicans govern. Donald Trump and Republicans have focused on things most Americans don't care about or don't like while refusing to focus on things Americans actually do care about.

Donald Trump and Republicans have focused on things most Americans don't care about or don't even like while refusing to focus on things Americans actually do care about.

Exhibit A of these things that Americans don't like is what is happening today in the House of Representatives. As soon as today, House Republicans will advance a budget resolution clearing the way for perhaps the most draconian cuts to Medicaid in American history, all so Republicans can cut taxes for their billionaires club and have the American people pick up the tab and pay the price. This is in the category of things Americans really don't like.

There is only one proper way to describe the Republican plan that is moving through the House this week: radical. Radical. The Republican plan radically hurts American families while radically helping the billionaires club. Republicans are so eager to cut taxes for billionaires that they would increase the deficit by a trillion dollars or more to make room for their sweetheart-deal tax cuts for billionaires like Elon Musk.

Republicans are also pushing for trillions in cuts for working- and middle-class Americans, endangering everything from Medicaid to nutrition programs, to housing assistance, and so much more. The Republican bill could cut as much as $880 billion from Medicaid alone. That means 80 million Americans--kids, veterans, people with disabilities, rural Americans, the elderly--are all at risk.

And why? Why are Republicans putting these people at such risk and hurting things that benefit them--not waste; things that actually go to people and help them? They are doing it to make life easier for the billionaires club. They are doing it to cut taxes for the ultrawealthy.

Last week, here in the Senate, during vote-arama, I pushed an amendment that said we should have no tax breaks for billionaires. I pushed an amendment calling for no billionaire tax breaks if even one dollar of Medicaid spending was cut. What is more important: helping people get healthcare, helping the elderly stay in nursing homes, helping our veterans--especially those who may be out of work--get the healthcare they need? What is more important--that or a tax break for someone who is very wealthy already?

Well, on both amendments--the one that said no tax breaks for billionaires and the one that said no tax breaks for billionaires if even one dollar of Medicaid spending was cut--both times, Republicans overwhelmingly said no.

Let us hope--let us hope--it may be a distant hope, but let us hope that House Republicans show more courage, more compassion, and more common sense to reject these horrible, harmful, radical cuts.

This is not what the American people signed up for in this election. Billionaire tax cuts is a clear example of things Americans don't like. Just look at all the backlash Republicans are seeing in their townhalls. And Republicans know this. Republicans know that cutting taxes for wealthy billionaires is something most Americans don't like at all. They didn't campaign on it. Oh, no. I didn't hear any of our Republican colleagues who were running go home and say ``I want to cut taxes for the billionaires,'' although that is the first thing they are doing when they get here. Yet Republicans seem to be full steam ahead all the same.

This, of course, is part of the pattern I am talking about. Over the last month, Donald Trump and Republicans have spent their energy focused on things Americans don't like while refusing to focus on things Americans actually do care about--like inflation, rising prices.

We already see that Americans are upset with the Trump administration because prices continue to rise, as they have over the last many years. Donald Trump promised to bring down costs on day one. He said that the first day he is elected, he is going to start bringing costs down, but instead, inflation has gone up, grocery prices are up. Chicken, pork, steak--all more expensive. Eggs are up 15 percent from last month. All the while, Republicans are focused on things that Americans either don't like or don't care about.

Americans don't like, for instance, pardoning violent insurrectionists. It was one of the least popular things we have seen; a recent poll in the Washington Post is clear. But that was the first major decision Donald Trump made as President, the first major decision.

Most Americans don't care whether you call it the Gulf of Mexico or the Gulf of America or something else. Most Americans don't care about building hotels in Gaza or annexing Canada. Yet these are the things that Donald Trump is focused on to distract people from the fact that he doesn't actually have real solutions to the things Americans really worry about.

Of course, there are things that Republicans are focused on that make things actively worse. Most Americans don't think it is a great idea to get into a trade war with our closest allies. That is going to make trips to the grocery store even more expensive than they are now.

Of course, most Americans do care about making government more efficient. While everyone certainly supports cutting waste, Americans don't like the harmful chaos that Elon Musk and DOGE have unleashed. They don't want to see a rich billionaire treat Federal workers with immense disrespect. And make no mistake, Americans did not sign up for DOGE to endanger their Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid benefits. That is not government efficiency; that hurts the American people.

What DOGE is doing is chaos, and Americans know that the chaos being unleashed by DOGE is causing a lot of harm to the country. Americans don't want to see their air traffic safety personnel fired in droves, no questions asked. That is not government efficiency; that is chaos and danger at the airports and in airplanes, at security checkpoints.

Our veterans don't want to see the VA starved of resources. Someone came over to me the other day and said: My brother is in a VA hospital. He has a rare disease. Seven of the people were let go. Who is going to take care of him?

They don't want to hear about cuts to the Veterans Crisis Line, where veterans who may have come back from Iraq or Afghanistan with PTSD or other problems have a place to go and a place to call. That is not government efficiency, cutting the Veterans Crisis Line; that is just more chaos, more harm, more hurt. Can you imagine the callousness of firing personnel who operate the veterans suicide crisis line, as was reported by the staff at the VA? It is a cruel and vindictive way to treat America's heroes.

Of course, our 9/11 families did not sign up for DOGE trying to cut the 9/11 survivor health program--the people who rushed to the Towers, the brave heroes, police, fire, first responders, and others who rushed to the Towers in the days after that horrible day of 9/11 and got illnesses in their lungs and gastrointestinal tracts and now are getting some help. The 9/11 families didn't sign up to cut that, but that is precisely what DOGE tried to do. We pushed back, and I am glad that President Trump and DOGE reversed themselves on that issue. They should be reversing themselves on many other issues also that hurt people so badly.

But the takeaway is they are very clear: What DOGE is doing is not making government more efficient; it is creating more chaos. And if there is one thing Americans don't want in these turbulent times, it is more chaos.

Rather than actually cut waste in government in a smart way, a careful way, an efficient way; rather than putting the needs of working people first, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and the Republican Party have plunged basic government services into chaos and taken a meat ax at programs that help workers, middle-class families, and low-income Americans, all for the sake of cutting taxes for billionaires and mega corporations.

Republicans are focused on the wrong things. They are helping the wrong people, and they are ignoring the vast majority of Americans they promised to serve.

Under Donald Trump's Republican Party, billionaires win, American families lose.

So let me say it once again. Over the last month, it has become clear how Donald Trump and Republicans govern. Donald Trump and Republicans have focused on things Americans don't care about or don't like while refusing to focus on things Americans actually do care about.

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