Executive Session
Floor Speech
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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, today I wish to talk about this administration's proposed budget. I believe the President's proposed budget fails the American people. It fails small businesses, and it fails our economic future.
To me, this budget spends too much on bailouts and on wasteful Government programs. It raises the cost of energy, and it costs American jobs.
The spending in this budget is so massive that independent estimates say they are going to need another quarter million people--250,000 more Federal Washington bureaucratic workers--just to spend all the money.
Middle-class families and small businesses all across this country are taking notice. These are the people who are making the financial sacrifices every day to pay for these huge Government expenses. Yet Washington continues to spend trillions in taxpayers' dollars on bailouts and big Government programs.
This budget spends too much, it taxes too much, and it borrows too much.
This budget contains the largest tax increase in the history of our country. We need to help American industry promote growth and create jobs. I will tell you that raising taxes makes matters worse, especially in an economic downturn.
The President's plan takes money from small businesses and families in my home State of Wyoming. The President's budget will devastate the small businesses of America. The budget even limits itemized deductions for people who give money to charities. This effectively raises our Nation's top tax rate to 42 percent.
Our Treasury Secretary Geithner says the proposed changes in the tax rates would apply to only 2 or 3 percent of small business owners. But the reality is, those tax increases are going to hit hardest those small businesses which create the most jobs in our Nation.
Small businesses created a majority of new jobs in America over the last 10 years. Small businesses are responsible for 70 percent of the job creation in this Nation.
These jobs are being created by businesses similar to those that are now threatened by the administration's proposed tax increases. When we consider that the administration talks about a goal of job creation, why is this administration proposing a budget with costly tax hikes on those very engines that create the jobs in this Nation?
They say: We are going to delay the tax increases until 2010. That doesn't make those tax increases hurt any less. Small business owners plan ahead. They plan well in advance. They will not hire someone today if they know they are going to be forced to lay that person off in less than 2 years.
I want to talk a little bit about electric bills.
Electric bills and the cost of everything manufactured in America is going to skyrocket under this proposed budget. Under the Obama budget, gasoline prices are likely to go up as much as 145 percent.
The President from Duke Energy says the plan could increase energy prices for American households by as much as 40 percent.
People need to know under this plan, anything that emits carbon is going to be more expensive. This means the plastics we use, the cars we drive, the homes we heat--they are all going to be more expensive. Every time you flip the light switch, you are going to be paying much more.
The very building blocks of our Nation will be dramatically taxed. American families will experience a dramatic shift down the economic ladder.
Folks who are struggling to get by in my home State of Wyoming and all across America will fall through the cracks in this budget. It is wrong. It is time this administration leveled with the American people about the hidden details in this budget plan.
The President is proposing we spend scarce resources transferring income rather than promoting growth.
According to the President's climate proposal, taxes on carbon are projected to total over $78 billion in 2012 and at least $646 billion over the next 10 years. Of that money, he proposes to spend $1 out of every $5--only $1 of every $5--on clean energy technologies. The other $4 of every $5 are going to go to bigger Government programs.
According to the President's budget document, his climate change proposal is more expensive than the $646 billion he has suggested. He is hiding the true cost to the economy of his cap-and-trade scheme.
The President is also abandoning what I call 24-hour power. Under his cap-and-trade scheme, that is power that runs the factories and American homes 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is the power we need when renewable energy is not there--when the Sun is not shining or the wind is not blowing. We need all the energy. We need the coal. We need the nuclear. We need the natural gas. We need the hydropower. All are proven and affordable energy solutions. Those are the kinds of things that will help keep electric bills low.
If you eliminate these, you are automatically taxing all Americans with high energy bills--that is what you are doing--and that means making the cost of running a business more expensive. That means heating homes all across America will be much more expensive.
They have done some estimates, and they have estimated that the President's new energy tax will cost every household in America an additional $250--not each year but $250 each month.
Frankly, that is a tax increase that most American people cannot afford, and, frankly, I don't understand why the President is asking them to pay it.
In reality, the President's cap-and-trade scheme is another bailout, a trillion-dollar climate bailout.
This budget spends too much, it taxes too much, and it borrows too much.
This budget costs too much in dollars, and it costs too much in jobs. This budget hurts small businesses, and it hurts American families alike.
This budget provides for the largest tax increase in history to fund a trillion-dollar climate bailout. It is unfortunate that we are aiming and targeting small businesses because they are the very foundation of job creation in this country. It is unfortunate that this is the starting point of the debate of how to get our economy moving again.
The American people expect better. The American people demand better. The American people deserve better.
Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
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