Government Funding

Floor Speech

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Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, we are now approaching day seven of the government shutdown. The Republicans control the House. They control the Senate. They control the White House. They run the government, and they have the responsibility to keep the government open.

And in that light, it might be a good idea and a radical idea, but in the midst of the crises that we are facing, it really might be nice for Speaker Johnson to actually bring House Members back to Washington after their 18-day vacation.

The American people are nervous about this shutdown. Federal employees are deeply disturbed. People are frightened. Republicans in the House should return to work.

As we all know, Senate rules require a 60-vote majority in order to pass a budget--60 votes. And that means that passing a budget requires bipartisan support. That is why, decades ago, the rules were established. It is very rare that one party has more than 60 votes.

So if you need 60 votes, it means that you have to compromise; you have to negotiate.

When Democrats were in power, they had to work with Republicans to get the 60 votes. When Republicans, in the past, were in power, they had to work with Democrats to get the 60 votes. That is the way it worked.

But not now. This time around, the Republicans have refused to negotiate. Basically, what they are saying is it is their way or the highway, take it or leave it. So within that context of Republicans refusing to negotiate, what is the shutdown about? What are the major issues that separate the parties?

Well, it is not complicated. As everybody in America knows, our healthcare system today is broken; it is dysfunctional; it is cruel. We are the wealthiest country in the history of the world, but we are the only major country not to guarantee healthcare to all people as a human right.

And, in fact, our healthcare outcomes are worse, in most cases, than other major countries. It is a broken system.

Today, in the richest country on Earth, 85 million Americans are uninsured or underinsured, and that results in some 60,000 Americans dying every single year, unnecessarily, because they can't afford to go to a doctor.

We pay the highest prices in the world for healthcare. It is unbelievable and unsustainable. We are now spending over $14,000 for every man, woman, and child. When you throw in Medicare, Medicaid, employer-covered healthcare, individual costs--over $14,000. That is insane, almost twice as much as other countries around the world.

We pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. One out of four Americans can't afford to go and fill the prescription their doctors write. In America today, in our great country, we don't have enough doctors. People all over America--Vermont and all over America--have to wait months to get in to see a specialist. We don't have enough nurses--massive nursing shortage. We don't have enough dentists. We don't have enough mental health counselors. And our life expectancy--how long we live--is substantially lower than other major countries, despite the fact that we spend so much more.

Now, given that reality, given that our healthcare system is broken, one might think that the issue we are debating today is, How do we improve it? How do we make sure that in America we appreciate healthcare as a human right? Which it is. How do we guarantee healthcare to every man, woman, and child in a cost-effective way?

In my view, that is moving toward a Medicare for All, single-payer system. If other people got ideas, bring them forward. Healthcare is a human right.

But that is not the debate we are having now. The debate we are having now is not how we improve a broken healthcare system but how we prevent a broken healthcare system from becoming even worse. And I will tell you, as the ranking member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, somebody who has studied this issue for a while, I feel very much that if we do not stop Trump's attack on the American healthcare system, the entire system could collapse.

We are on the verge of that right now. People can't afford healthcare. People can't find doctors. People can't find mental health counselors. People can't afford prescription drugs. We have a drug epidemic. We are on the verge of collapse.

What this debate is about in Florida, in Vermont, and all over this country is, if the Republicans get their way and if Democrats cave in, health insurance premiums will double for over 20 million people on the Affordable Care Act. Yes, you heard right--20 million people will see a doubling of their healthcare premiums. You can't afford healthcare now? Of course, you can't. It is outrageously high.

That is not Bernie Sanders talking. That is the Kaiser Family Foundation study. That is one of the most conservative Members, Republican Members, of the House, Marjorie Taylor Greene, making that point. A doubling of health insurance premiums.

Does any Member of the U.S. Senate want to go home to their district and explain why you are going to double premiums?

It is not just raising the outrageous cost of healthcare in America even higher, as a result of Trump's Big Beautiful Bill, 15 million Americans are going to be thrown off of the healthcare they have because Trump and the Republicans made the largest cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act in American history.

Let us be very clear. These cuts not only impact 15 million Americans--that would be a tragedy unto itself--they will devastate nursing homes.

Right now, the situation on nursing homes in Vermont and I expect many other States in this country is a disaster. They are understaffed. Nursing homes, in an aging society, are shutting down. Where will people who are old and can't take care of themselves, who are disabled--what happens to them if the nursing home industry collapses in America?

Community health centers are something that I have worked on for many years to increase funding. Over 32 million people access community health centers. They provide primary health care, dental care, mental health counseling, lower cost prescription drugs. They will suffer enormously, cut back on services, and perhaps shut down because of that legislation if we do not deal with that.

Rural hospitals. Republicans say: Oh, we put $50 billion into rural hospitals.

Yes, but you cut $150 billion. All over this country, rural hospitals are teetering on the edge. Many of them have already closed down over the years. So if you live in rural America--the State of Vermont--and you want a hospital nearby? Well, that hospital may not be there.

Now, why did Trump and the Republicans make these massive cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act? The answer is not complicated. It was important for them to provide $1 trillion to the top 1 percent--$1 trillion. Massive cuts to healthcare; $1 trillion in tax breaks to the 1 percent.

Let me make the very radical suggestion that Elon Musk, who is now worth some $500 billion, does not need another tax break. Today, we have more income and wealth inequality than we have ever had in the history of America. Musk himself owns more wealth than the bottom 52 percent of American households. The top 1 percent owns more wealth than the bottom 93 percent. Never before have we seen such income and wealth disparity.

Republicans said ``We are going to massively cut Medicaid, ACA'' in order to give tax breaks to the richest people in America.

But the issue that we are debating is not just healthcare, as enormously important as that is; what we are talking about is whether we are going to allow our country to move toward an authoritarian society run by a President who is a megalomaniac, who wants more and more power in his own hands, who does not respect the rule of law or the Constitution of the United States of America.

It is not acceptable to me that our President is putting Federal troops on city streets throughout America without a request from a Governor or a mayor, trying to create provocations, trying to create disturbances so he can use military force against the American people.

We cannot allow masked ICE agents to snatch people off of our streets without due process.

We cannot continue to allow President Trump to undermine the Constitution and the rule of law by refusing to spend money appropriated by Congress. Unbelievable.

The President says: Well, money was appropriated to States that committed a terrible crime.

Do you know what their crime was? They voted against Donald Trump. And in this world right now, I guess if a State votes against Trump, maybe they are not going to get the Federal money that was appropriated, whether it is Vermont, New York, New Jersey, or other States.

Is that really what the United States of America is about? A President says: You voted against me. You are not going to get your tax dollars back in Federal investments.

According to every poll that I have seen, the American people by huge numbers do not want to see a doubling of their healthcare premiums. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 78 percent of Americans, including 59 percent of Republicans, want to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits, and the polling numbers are equally high or almost as high on making sure that people are not thrown off of Medicaid.

Tony Fabrizio, who is President Trump's own pollster--not just a general pollster; he is the pollster for the President. This is what he said:

By broad bipartisan margins, voters want to see the [ACA] tax credits extended rather than expire at the end of the year, whether in the context of premiums doubling or 5 million families losing their health insurance. This includes solid majorities of Trump voters and swing voters.

That is the Republican pollster.

Right now in the House, to the best of my knowledge, there are at least 14 Republicans in a very tightly controlled caucus who want to see the ACA tax credits extended. Here in the Senate, there is at least one Republican Senator who understands that in his State, his people cannot afford a doubling of premiums. My strong feeling is that there are many, many other Republicans who are not excited about going home and explaining to their constituents why their premiums are doubling.

As the ranking member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, I asked people across the country in the last few days what these healthcare cuts that the Republicans are pushing would mean for them. We just sent out emails, and we have gotten many, many, many hundreds of responses.

We asked them: What would a doubling of healthcare premiums mean to your life and your family? What would it mean if you were one of the 15 million Americans thrown off of healthcare through cuts in Medicaid? What would it mean to you if the rural hospital near you shut down because of these Medicaid cuts?

In less than a week, we received responses--many hundreds--from 42 States and the District of Columbia. Today, we are releasing a report that describes the devastating human impact of the Republican budget and its massive cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act. Here is just some of what we found:

People are afraid that they could get sicker or even die.

Laura--won't give her last name--from Wisconsin said:

I live in fear of whether or not I will be able to afford my life saving treatment. I have a rare kidney disease that requires immunotherapy every 9 months. I'm terrified I'll die.

We got a lot of those--people who are dealing with very serious illnesses who, in fact, will die. They will die if they cannot afford health insurance, and they will not be able to afford health insurance if their premiums double or if they are thrown off of Medicaid.

But it is not just the fear that people will die or get sicker because they lack healthcare; all over this country, working-class Americans will not be able to afford the food they need, pay their rent or their mortgage or their healthcare.

Brittanie from Utah writes:

I'm already living paycheck to paycheck. I have insurance for myself and my two sons. Just bought a house that we can barely afford.

So she is hanging on the edge. If she has to pay more for healthcare, maybe she loses her house.

Sebastian from Colorado writes:

I don't make enough to afford rent and food and health insurance. Only 2 of those things do I need to survive. These cuts make it even more impossible to turn things around and get a handle on health issues.

In other words, 60 percent of our people are living paycheck to paycheck. Today, they can't afford housing. Today, they can't afford childcare. Today, they can't afford good-quality food for their kids. Today, they can't afford to send their kids to college. Double healthcare premiums, and these families are going to be in disastrous shape.

Cara from Vermont said that she ``was shocked by warning about the loss of the advanced federal subsidy. Rather than a premium of $100 [a] month, I could be paying more than $1,200 [a] month or 35 percent of my income, and that's before deductibles and copays.''

By the way, when we talk about a doubling of health insurance premiums, that is on average. Some people will pay less; some people will pay a lot more.

Small business owners are concerned they will have to shut down.

Joe from Pennsylvania writes:

I am a small business owner and if my health care costs continue to rise, I will be forced to close my business and look for a job, if I can find one.

Patricia from rural California writes:

If our local clinics and hospitals close, as they are likely to do with federal funding disappearing along with health insurance becoming unaffordable, people will die.

She is right.

On average, healthcare premiums will double, but here is what happens when it is not average. If you are living in Virginia, your premiums could go up from less than $650 a month today to nearly $2,200 a month next year--$650 to $2,200. That is not a doubling, it is almost a quadrupling of what you are paying. If you live in Idaho, your premiums could go up from $283 a month to $407 a month. If you live in the State of Georgia, your family could see their premiums go up from $940 a month today to over $4,000 a month.

At a time when people today cannot afford healthcare, the idea of doubling, tripling healthcare premiums is insane. It is unacceptable. No Member of the U.S. Senate should support that.

So, no, I am not going to go back to Vermont and tell the people there that I have thrown 15 million Americans off the healthcare that they have at a time when studies indicate that would mean that tens and tens of thousands of people will die as a result. I am not going to do that.

And I am not going to vote for a healthcare situation which doubles premiums for 20 million Americans.

So we are where we are right now. And the time is now when the U.S. Congress has got to look beyond their campaign contributors, has got to look beyond the oligarchs that fund their campaigns, and has got to begin standing up for ordinary Americans.

Our job is to improve a broken healthcare system and guarantee healthcare to all. Our job is not to throw 15 million people off healthcare and double premiums for more than 20 million, to shutter nursing homes, community health centers, and rural hospitals. The choice is clear. Let us stand with the American people.

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