-9999

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, last night, nearly 2 years to the day of Hamas's vicious attack on October 7, after nearly 2 long years of devastating war in Gaza, it appears that a cease-fire and hostage agreement has been reached. If this agreement is implemented, then, finally, after 2 years of immense suffering, the hostages could soon be free, there could be a cease-fire, and the victims of this painful conflict can start to rebuild their lives. This brings a huge sigh of relief to the hostage families, to all of Israel, and to Palestinians who have suffered for so long in this horrific humanitarian catastrophe.

Now, we await details and final acceptance and implementation from all parties of the first phase, and we must begin the even harder work of closing negotiations to end the war, to start building the day after in Gaza without Hamas, to surge humanitarian assistance to Palestinians in Gaza, and to build a lasting peace--a lasting peace--that ensures security and dignity for Israelis and Palestinians alike.

This morning, I hope and pray that all of the hostages are released, including the deceased hostages. I will never give up until all of the hostages are home, including the remains of my constituents Omer Neutra and Itay Chen. I have gotten to know their families well over the last 2 years, and I share their desperation to bring them home for proper burial and closure.

The work is not over, but any step to end this nightmare is one that should be celebrated and carefully implemented. Government Funding

Mr. President, now, on the shutdown and the Trump administration, the Federal Government has now been shut down for more than a week, but Donald Trump, Speaker Johnson, and Republicans in Congress are nowhere to be found. Instead of playing with people's lives, Donald Trump and Republican leaders in Congress need to sit down with Democrats and have a serious negotiation to fix healthcare and reopen the government at once.

Workers are starting to miss out on paychecks. Seniors are worried about delays at the Social Security Administration. Small businesses with government contracts are in the dark.

We need to end this shutdown as soon as possible. Every day that Republicans refuse to negotiate to end this shutdown, the worse it gets for Americans, and the clearer it becomes who is fighting for them.

Each day, our case to fix healthcare and end the shutdown gets better and better, stronger and stronger, because families are opening their letters showing how high their premiums will climb if Republicans get their way. They are seeing why this fight matters. It is about protecting their healthcare, their bank accounts, their futures.

But Republicans are absent. The House is literally on vacation. And Donald Trump, meanwhile, continues to play with people's lives and threaten mass layoffs for Federal workers.

Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Republican leaders in Congress have been urging the administration not to follow through with their threats of mass layoffs and no back pay for furloughed Federal workers. The Journal wrote that ``far-reaching government cuts and firings could backfire with the public.'' And aides have been ``warning that such moves could cause voters to blame Republicans for the shutdown.'' That is the Wall Street Journal.

Well, this is spot-on. If Donald Trump thinks that punishing Federal workers and treating the American public as pawns is going to help him politically, he is making a terrible mistake, because the American people are smart. They see what Trump and the Republicans are doing. They know Republicans are the ones in charge. They have the Presidency, the House, and the Senate--not Democrats.

We Democrats want to end this shutdown as quickly as we can, but Donald Trump and Republicans need to negotiate with us in a serious way to fix the healthcare premiums crisis. We can and should do both. It is not either-or, like Republicans think.

President Trump, meanwhile, is simply not taking this shutdown seriously, because, as we speak, the Trump administration continues to negotiate a $20 billion bailout for Argentina to prop up a MAGA ally. Apparently, Donald Trump thinks that $20 billion for a MAGA-friendly government in Argentina is fine, but fixing healthcare premiums here at home is not.

Meanwhile, thanks to Trump's bungled trade war with China, American soybean farmers have been shut out of foreign markets and are facing mass bankruptcies. With American farmers cut out, farmers in countries like Argentina are taking advantage, selling a record number of soybeans to China. But instead of helping American farms now in the middle of a shutdown, Donald Trump wants to send $20 billion to Argentina to help them compete against American farmers, all while hungry Americans face higher grocery prices and the largest cuts ever to nutrition aid, thanks to Donald Trump and the Republicans' ``Big Ugly Bill.''

It is utter lunacy. Whose side is Donald Trump on?

And the situation is no better here in Congress. In the middle of a shutdown crisis, Speaker Johnson has shut the lights off to the Halls of Congress. We Democrats have made clear that Republicans need to engage with us in serious negotiation to end this destructive shutdown and fix healthcare premiums as soon as we can, but Speaker Johnson has sent the House on vacation. He has sent Members home now for 3 weeks, and it sounds like he will keep them away for at least another week more. The House of Representatives has not held a vote--a single vote-- since September 19, 20 days ago.

In fact, would you care to guess how many days the House has been in town since the end of July? Twelve days. That is it. Since the summer, the House of Representatives has held votes for only 12 days.

If you are someone who works two jobs or works weekends or overtime to make ends meet, what on Earth are you supposed to think when House Republicans can't even be bothered to show up to reopen the government?

House Republicans are getting paid and not working, and they are asking Federal workers to work and not get paid. If your electricity prices are skyrocketing, if your premiums are going up by thousands of dollars, if you are getting charged more for a cup of coffee or your groceries, and you see Republicans on vacation for 3 weeks straight, that is basically a middle finger to hard-working Americans.

And let's be clear. The Speaker's dig-in-at-all-costs approach is not sitting well with some Members of his own party.

Yesterday, Marjorie Taylor Greene said the following:

The House has so much work to do, why aren't we coming back in session? We could be doing appropriations, passing important bills, and more.

Representative Massie of Kentucky tweeted something similar:

The government is shut down, but the House refuses to go back in session. Why are we in recess?

Said Republican Massie.

Because the day we go back into session, I have 218 votes for the discharge petition to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files.

Representative Kevin Kiley of California, Republican, meanwhile, posted this:

The Speaker shouldn't even think about cancelling session for a third straight week.

So the cracks are showing on the Republican side because they know Speaker Johnson's position of not budging on healthcare fixes is untenable.

And in Louisiana, in fact, I would have thought that of all people interested in fixing ACA premiums, it would have been a Representative from the State of Louisiana. Yesterday, I read a sobering report from the Times-Picayune saying that ``Louisiana stands to lose the most'' if the ACA premium tax credits expire.

According to that report, 85,000 Louisiana residents will lose health insurance. Many will see their premiums skyrocket. The average 60-year- old Louisiana couple making $85,000 a year would see insurance costs rise from $600 a month to $2,000 a month.

Hear that, Mr. Speaker? That is your constituents. Good Americans in your own State will suffer the most if the ACA premiums expire.

People will go bankrupt, people will get sick, people will die--all because the Speaker chose to keep the House on vacation, rather than come to work, negotiate with Democrats to fix this healthcare crisis, and end their Trump shutdown. Shameful.

We urge the Republicans to back away from their corner and have serious negotiations that the American people deserve and expect before people get sick and go bankrupt. Remembering Kevin McDonald

Mr. President, now, finally, on a different, more somber but grateful note, last month, the Senate lost a beloved member of our family: Kevin McDonald.

Kevin served as the scheduler for our former colleague Senator Patrick Leahy for over 30 years, and I know Patrick would be the first to admit that he wouldn't have had the great career he did without Kevin by his side.

I am sure there were many days when I called Patrick 10 or 20 times-- I still remember his phone number--or asked him to rush to my office in the middle of something else, and made Kevin's life hell trying to keep his schedule. But Kevin, the consummate professional he was, always found a way to make it work.

He made the hardest days feel easier. He made the busiest days feel smoother. And everyone who knew him, whether you were a Senator, a staffer, a parking attendant, or a police officer--everyone--just loved to be around him. He was the life of every party. He lit up every room he walked into and had an innate ability to turn friends into family.

We will all miss Kevin. We thank him for his service to the Senate, the State of Vermont, and the country. Our prayers are with his family, his friends, and his loved ones.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source