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Floor Speech
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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, yesterday, the Senate took a major step forward on the path to reopening the government.
The bill before us is simple. It is clean. It is bipartisan. It is a continuing resolution, and it funds the government through January. It is paired with three full-year appropriations bills.
So let me repeat that: appropriations bills for the full next year.
Now, these are bills that have already passed the Senate with bipartisan support--broad bipartisan support, I would add--and they were negotiated on a bipartisan basis with the House.
They are fully funded in terms of veterans' care, and this is critical. Tomorrow is Veterans Day. Our veterans need to know that we stand behind them.
It is also fully funded on food assistance: SNAP and Women, Infants, and Children.
That is what we are debating here on the floor of the U.S. Senate. I believe it is reasonable, it is responsible, and it is ready to go.
Let's remember that this shutdown has caused serious pain to many, many American families. People have stood in line around the block at food banks all across the country, and that is because 42 million Americans missed their SNAP payments.
Flights were delayed and canceled because control towers are understaffed. People there working are overworked. TSA agents and air traffic controllers have been working for the last 6 weeks without getting paid.
Yesterday, there were 2,300 flight cancellations. It looks like it may be even more than that today. Yesterday was one of the worst travel days in the last 2 years, and today may be worse.
This shutdown has hurt our economy, and it has hurt our country.
The government is finally on the path to reopening. It is the right result. This is what the American people need. They need certainty, and opening the government provides that level of certainty that the American people want, especially heading into the holidays.
I want to thank President Trump. I want to thank my colleagues in the Senate on both sides of the aisle who voted to support that.
The President stood strong when Chuck Schumer stood here and demanded that tens of billions of dollars be sent from the Federal Treasury directly to the bank accounts of health insurance companies. President Trump's leadership protected taxpayers and continues to protect the country.
Let's be clear about what comes next. The Senate is going to use the next few months to pass the additional appropriations bills that will completely fund the government for a full year.
There is a pressing need to strengthen our economy, to secure our border, to invest in our military, to promote fiscal responsibility, and we have to do that after 4 years of high prices and an open border. That is what Republicans in this body and across the hall are fighting for.
Let's be clear. Republicans are making the appropriations process work again. Last year, Senator Schumer refused to bring a single appropriations bill to the floor even though the appropriations committees passed out bipartisan, many times unanimous appropriations bills. Yet the minority leader refused to bring them to the floor. That is no way to run the government. That is no way to run the Senate. That is not leadership.
The debate ahead is also about the many failures of the Obama healthcare law known as ObamaCare. This is a debate Republicans welcome. Healthcare in American is broken and is unaffordable, and it broke the day they passed ObamaCare. Costs have exploded. ObamaCare premiums have gone up 221 percent. That is what has happened since the law passed.
You recall President Obama at the time said that premiums for families would go down by $2,500. It was all wrong. Democrats have no answer for that other than more direct subsidies directly from the Federal Government directly into the bank accounts of the insurance companies. Republicans believe Americans deserve high-quality, affordable healthcare. Americans haven't gotten that since the day ObamaCare became law.
It is time to reopen the government because Americans have waited and suffered too long.
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