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Floor Speech
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Mr. CRUZ. I thank Senator Johnson.
It is day 38 of the Schumer shutdown--the longest government shutdown in the history of the United States.
Now, Senator Schumer told the world:
Every day gets better for us.
Senator Sullivan asked: Who is the ``us''?
I will tell you who the ``us'' is.
This is a partisan political show. It happened because, in March, the Democrats decided to be reasonable and allow the government to stay open. And the extreme-left wing of the Democrat party got furious, and Senator Schumer nearly lost his job.
And now the government is shut down because the Democrats want to show the radical-left wing in their base that they really, really, really hate Donald Trump.
Now, on the Democrat side of the aisle, there is a talking point--a talking point we actually had in the Commerce Committee yesterday. One of our Democrat colleagues said: There is a Republican President. There is a Republican Senate. There is a Republican House. This is the Republicans' shutdown.
And I don't know who actually produces those talking points for Democrats, but every one of them, word for word, said the identical thing.
Well, I tell you, I spoke shortly thereafter, and I said: You know, every witness in a court of law, before they testify, they are sworn in, and they are asked that their testimony will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
I said: What my Democrat colleague just did there failed part No. 2, the whole truth.
You are right; there is a Republican President. You are right; there is a Republican House. And you are right; there is a Republican Senate. What the Democrats also know is that, under the Senate rules, it takes 60 Senators to vote to fund the government. They all know that. That is not something they don't know, and it is not an accident that they don't mention it.
Why do we have a shutdown? Well, let's count. There are 53 desks on this side of the Senate floor. There are 53 Republicans, which means the government cannot be funded until at least 7 Democrats decide we are going to fund the government.
By the way, this is not a new development. When Joe Biden was President, 13 separate times we passed a clean continuing resolution. What does that mean? We had a 60-vote threshold then too. That means Republicans could have done this garbage any of the 13 times under Joe Biden, but we did not. They didn't have 60 votes. What was different when Joe Biden was President is Republicans voted with the Democrats to allow the government to stay open.
And, by the way, in March, the Democrats knew that was the responsible thing to do. It does not take much on the magic Google machine to get video of every one of these Democrats saying on TV: Government shutdowns are reckless. They are irresponsible. They are wrong.
They all know that. But you know what they are counting on? I look up, and the press gallery is virtually empty. They are counting on ABC, NBC, and CBS lying to the American people. They are counting on CNN lying to the American people. They are counting on MSNBC lying to the American people.
This is not complicated. Fourteen times the Republicans on this side of the floor have voted to open the government, and 14 times Democrats have voted to keep the government closed.
And then, after they vote to keep the government closed, the Democrats walk out to the reporters and say: Gosh, I can't believe the Republicans closed the government. That is when a reporter is actually supposed to do something really radical. It is called ``report.'' The person telling me he or she is upset at the government shutdown, why did you vote 14 times to keep the government shut down?
Now, there are lots of aspects of this that are painful, but there is one in particular that has impacted American families all over the country, which is any family that is traveling--traveling for work, traveling to visit a sick relative, traveling to go to a funeral in a family, traveling to go on a family vacation. There are, right now, over 50,000 TSA agents. Many of them are going to work. They are not getting paid. They missed their paycheck.
There are, right now, more than 14,000 air traffic controllers. Many of them are going to work. None of them are getting paid.
That means they are trying to figure out--their last paycheck didn't come. They are trying to figure out: How do I pay my mortgage? How do I pay my rent? How do I pay my food? How do I feed my kids? How do I take care of medical bills?
You know what the answer from the Democrats is?
Every day gets better for us.
If you are hurting and not getting a paycheck, Senator Schumer's answer--I do appreciate his doing the Mr. Burns tent with his hands. I wish he had started off with ``excellent.'' But that is, in fact, his quote:
Every day gets better for us.
On Wednesday, there were over 15,000 flight delays. On Wednesday, there were over 600 canceled flights.
Delta Airlines has called on the Democrats: Vote to reopen the government.
United Airlines has called on the Democrats: Vote to reopen the government.
Southwest Airlines has called on the Democrats: Vote to reopen the government.
American Airlines has called on the Democrats: Vote to reopen the government.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association has called on the Democrats: Vote to reopen the government.
Yesterday, I had a conversation with the Administrator of the FAA. It was chilling. As everyone knows, the FAA announced that it is putting in place a mandatory 10-percent reduction in flights in the 40 largest airports in America. What the Administrator of the FAA told me yesterday on the phone was why, and here is what Administrator Bedford said. He said: Last Friday, which was Halloween, half of the busiest 30 air traffic control facilities were short-staffed. That includes New York, Austin, Newark, Phoenix, Washington, Nashville, Dallas, and Denver.
I want you to listen to this next statistic.
Nearly 80 percent of the air traffic controllers in New York City called out. They did not show up to work--nearly 80 percent. Senator Schumer represents New York City. Nearly 80 percent of the controllers called out on Halloween.
There were rampant delays. The FAA said the aggregate data, the whole national air space system, looked OK. But then they deaggregated the data. Looking at the 40 biggest airports, in particular, painted a very different picture.
Here is what the Administrator of the FAA told me: Pilots filed more than 500 voluntary safety reports about air traffic control problems they were encountering--air traffic controllers that were fatigued, that were tired, that were making mistakes.
And what is the Democrats' view? Well, there is an old line that a gaff is when someone in Washington accidentally tells the truth. You heard Chuck Schumer say:
Every day gets better for us.
Here is what one Democrat aide told CNN.
Another senior Democrat aide said as long as public perception is in their favor, the party will not concede short of ``planes falling out of the sky.''
That is out of the words of the Democrats themselves.
Let me tell you, as chairman of the Commerce Committee, part of our responsibility is to oversee the FAA and to do everything possible to ensure safety.
Turning to my Democrat colleagues, saying: This is not a joke.
First of all, the shutdown happened because Senator Schumer had to demonstrate he was tough so he didn't get primaried by AOC in New York.
Then the next threshold was the No Kings rallies. They had to show they were tough enough that, when radicals were marching in cities across the country, they were as angry as the blue-haired, angry radicals.
Then we had election day. They were going to keep everything shut down until election day because it energized their base. And then Democrats won elections in the very blue State of New Jersey, the very blue State of Virginia, and the insanely blue city of New York City. And, suddenly, Democrats said: Holy cow. Our really leftwing voters like it when we shut the government down.
Are there any Democrats on that side of the aisle for whom responsibility matters? Or is every one of them proud to say: We will keep it shut down until planes fall out of the sky.
God forbid that comes to pass. Over 500 voluntary safety reports about air traffic controllers. You have got air traffic controllers driving Uber to pay their bills.
And here is the good news. We can resolve it right now. Senator Johnson's bill, that we will vote on in just a few minutes, is very simple. It says: Any Federal worker that goes to work will be paid. If you have to work--if you are a soldier, if you are manning the wall, keeping this country safe, you are being forced to work, you will be paid. If you are a Border Patrol agent, if you are an FBI agent, if you are a TSA agent, and you have to work, you will be paid.
And if you are an air traffic controller and your job is literally keeping, Mr. President, your children and my children safe when they get on an airplane, you will be paid.
And to those in the media who persist in repeating Democrat talking points, understand this: The vote right now, if we vote yes, the air traffic controllers will be paid. If we vote no, the air traffic controllers will not be paid. So every Democrat who votes no is saying: We will not pay the air traffic controllers.
What does that mean? There are roughly 45,000 commercial flights a day in the United States. The 10-percent reduction that the FAA has put in place will be roughly 5,000 flights a day that will be canceled. Now, if you assume 100 passengers are on each flight--I am a lawyer, not a mathematician. So I am going to make the math simple. So 100 passengers, 500 flights a day, that is more than 500,000 Americans who will have their flight canceled each and every day the Schumer shutdown continues--more than 500,000. And millions more will have their flights delayed.
So it is a simple choice. It is a simple choice. Do you want to pay the air traffic controllers or not?
But I have got to tell you, you had better be ready to talk to your constituents who said: Why was my plane canceled when I was going to see my sick mother?
Well, because I, Democrat, voted against paying air traffic controllers. That is the answer.
You won't like getting that answer, but I tell you what, that is a lot better answer than if you have to look in the eyes of someone whose family was killed because the Democrats get what they are explicitly asking for, which is planes falling from the sky.
The Schumer shutdown--you are a leftwing, partisan Democrat, you say:
Every day gets better for us.
I will tell you who ``us'' ain't. It ain't the American people.
So do the right thing because every one of you knows it is the right thing. Vote yes. Pay the air traffic controllers, and end this ridiculous shutdown.
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