Making Continuing Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2014 - Motion to Proceed - Continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. CRUZ. Mr. President, these two unanimous consent requests have the virtue of clarifying this debate the Senate will face this week. I am going to suggest to the Presiding Officer that the Senate has not faced a more important debate in the short time he and I have both served in this institution. No American wants a government shutdown. I do not want a government shutdown. No one on this side of the aisle wants a government shutdown. The House of Representatives does not want a government shutdown.

Five minutes ago the Senate could have acted to prevent a government shutdown. The requests I promulgated to the majority leader were to pass the continuing resolution the House of Representatives passed. If that had happened, there would be no government shutdown. A government shutdown would be taken off the table. The specter the Presiding Officer and I see on the television screen every day--the countdown clock that has started to appear--would disappear. But unfortunately the majority leader chose to object--to object and to say, no, he would rather risk a government shutdown than act to prevent it. Why? Again, the majority leader was quite candid: because he supports the law called ObamaCare.

I would note that a component of that also--one of the pieces the House of Representatives passed--is a law that has been called the Default Prevention Act. The President of the United States has been doing a fair amount of public speaking, raising the prospect of a default on our debt. The House of Representatives acted boldly to include in their continuing resolution language that would say the United States will never, ever, ever default on its debt, that in the event the debt ceiling is not raised, we will always pay our debt first.

I suspect every Member of this body has spoken publicly about the calamity that would come from a default on the debt. I think it is quite revealing that the majority leader explicitly referenced and objected to by name taking a default off the table. I think that is unfortunate.

There is a tendency in this town toward brinkmanship, toward pointing to events that can cause instability and uncertainty and using them to try to get your way. I wish the majority leader had been willing to step forward and say: I agree, No. 1, that the government should be funded; we should not have a government shutdown; and, No. 2, that we should never ever even discuss a default on the debt.

Had the majority leader simply said, ``I consent,'' a default on the debt would have been taken permanently off the table. Why didn't he? We all know why he didn't. Because the majority leader embraces ObamaCare. I am going to suggest that this body a little over 3 years ago passed ObamaCare. It passed on a straight party-line vote. In the time since it has passed, America has learned it is not working. Americans all over this country are suffering because of ObamaCare. It is the single biggest job killer in America. Every day we are seeing more and more evidence that ObamaCare is killing jobs; that it is hurting American workers who are struggling; that it is causing people to be forcibly put into part-time work, 29 hours a week; that it is jacking up their health insurance premiums. It is causing more and more people, who are struggling, to lose their health insurance altogether.

Today the New York Times reported that because of ObamaCare, ``Insurers are significantly limiting the choices of doctors and hospitals available to consumers.'' That is today in the newspaper.

USA Today reported on a new ``family glitch'' that could cause up to a half million children to go without insurance coverage.

A headline in the Washington Post today read, ``One week away, ObamaCare's small business insurance exchanges not all ready for launch.''

Even the labor unions that once championed ObamaCare are now publicly decrying it as a threat to the 40-hour workweek that is the backbone of the American middle class. That is in the words of organized labor.

This law is hurting the American people. It is why there is bipartisan consensus outside of Washington, DC, that we need to step up and stop it. That would be the responsible thing for Senators on both sides of the aisle to do, to say: The same rules should apply to hard-working American families that apply to big corporations and that apply to Members of Congress.

We have seen the President unilaterally put in place exceptions for giant corporations and Members of Congress. I would submit, hard-working American families deserve that same exception. So I think it is unfortunate the majority leader chose to object to continuing government, to preventing a shutdown, to taking a default off the table. But I do think it is clarifying to make clear, as the majority leader just did, that he is willing to risk a government shutdown. He is willing to force even a government shutdown in order to insist that ObamaCare is funded.

That leads to the second unanimous consent request I put forward, a simple request that every amendment on this continuing resolution be subject to 60 votes. Everyone in this body knows that is not an unusual request in the Senate. Amendments in this body are routinely subjected to 60-vote thresholds. Indeed, a few months ago when this body was debating the issue of guns--a contentious issue, an emotional issue, an issue of great moment for this country--the majority leader agreed with the minority that every single amendment on the floor would be subject to a 60-vote threshold. Those were the terms under which every aspect of the gun debate was debated.

I would note that one amendment that was submitted during that gun debate was the Grassley-Cruz amendment. It was the law enforcement amendment that put real teeth in going after felons and fugitives who try to illegally buy guns. It put real teeth into forcing States to report mental health records so we can prevent those with serious mental illnesses from illegally purchasing firearms.

I would note that the Grassley-Cruz amendment received a majority vote in this institution. A majority of Senators voted for it, including nine Democrats. It was the most bipartisan of the comprehensive gun amendments voted on in this body. Yet it did not pass into law because the majority leader set a 60-vote threshold for every amendment.

I would suggest that ObamaCare is no less important. ObamaCare is no less controversial. ObamaCare, likewise, should be subject to the same threshold. If the majority leader believes ObamaCare is good for America, if the Democrats in this body believe ObamaCare is good for America, then I would encourage this body, let's debate--not in the artificial sense in which we debate, one or two Senators talking to an empty hall, but in the real sense of making the case to each other and the American people about whether this law is working or whether it is not. Because everywhere I travel in the State of Texas and across the country, Americans come to me and raise the single biggest challenge they are facing: ObamaCare. It is killing their jobs. It is taking their health care. It is not working.

We all know that 3 1/2 years ago ObamaCare was forced into law on a strict party-line vote, by straight, brute force. But it should not be funded that way. That is not the way a government should proceed. That is not the way this institution should proceed. A 60-vote threshold does not require that the majority leader get a great many Republican votes, but it does require that he get a few, that he cannot simply do it with the votes of only the Democrats in this body.

This country will be better off if we work together to restore economic growth and to stop the incredible job loss that is coming from ObamaCare. In fact, regarding a 60-vote threshold, here is what the learned majority leader has had to say:

For more than 200 years, the rules of the Senate have protected the American people and rightfully so. The need to muster 60 votes in order to terminate Senate debate naturally frustrates the majority and oftentimes the minority. I am sure it will frustrate me when I assume the office of majority leader in a few weeks. But I recognize this requirement as a tool that serves the long-term interests of the Senate and the American people and our country.

I agree with Majority Leader Reid. I agree that 60-vote thresholds ensure that we behave not just in a partisan manner but in a way that brings us together. Given the challenges coming from ObamaCare, I believe nothing is hurting the American people more, nothing is hurting the economy more, nothing is damaging jobs more, than ObamaCare.

Given the majority leader's objection raised today, the path the majority intends to go down is now clear. It is clear to Democrats, it is clear to Republicans, it is clear for the world to see: The majority leader has stated it is his intention to force a vote to fund ObamaCare, and do so using just 51 votes, to do so on what could be a straight party-line vote, in all likelihood would be a straight party-line vote.

I would suggest that is not a responsible course of action. It is not a course of action that I think Republicans should acquiesce to. If it is the majority leader's intent to fund ObamaCare using just 51 votes, then I would submit to every Republican in this body it is our obligation to our constituents to do everything we can to prevent the majority leader from funding ObamaCare with 51 votes. Any Member of this body who votes for cloture on this bill will be voting to allow the majority leader to fund ObamaCare on 51 votes. I think that vote is a mistake. I think that vote disserves our constituents. I think that vote hurts the people of America.

So 232 Members of the House of Representatives came together and said explicitly: Do not fund ObamaCare. I would note that included two Democrats who came together with Republicans in a bipartisan manner to say: This law is not working. Maybe we thought it would work, but the facts, the evidence, have proven it is not working.

The Senate should do likewise. The House acted last week because the House listened to the American people. I would suggest that every Member of this body should do exactly the same: Listen to the American people. Because if we listen to the American people, we will, No. 1, keep the government running. I wish the majority leader had agreed to my request to take a government shutdown off the table by passing the House continuing resolution.

If we listen to the American people, we will, No. 2, take any default on the debt off the table. I wish the majority leader had not objected to doing so right now. I wish the majority leader had not said he intends to continue to use the threat of a default to engage in brinkmanship to try to force ObamaCare on the American people.

If we listen to the American people, we will recognize that this law is not working. That is why big corporations asked for and received an exception. That is why Members of Congress asked for and received an exception. That is why unions have recently come forward and asked for an exception. They have not yet been granted it, but I will venture a prediction now that if Congress votes to continue funding ObamaCare, that union exception will not be far away. Then we will be left in a world where the burdens of ObamaCare, the job-killing consequences of ObamaCare, fall on hard-working American families, not on big corporations, not on Members of Congress and, in the near future, I predict not on union bosses, only on hard-working American families, on single moms, on young people, on people struggling to climb the economic ladder.

I would suggest that is getting it exactly backward. This body should be not be granting special rules, special favors for the ruling class, for those with power and privilege. We should be fighting for those who are struggling. Those are the people who are getting hurt the most by ObamaCare.

I believe this week will be a critical week for the Senate, where every one of us--and I hope to see Republicans and Democrats stand together and to say, setting aside partisan differences, we have an obligation to the people of our States. ObamaCare is not working, so we are going to step forward and recognize the simple reality that it is the biggest job killer in this country and we should not affirmatively fund it.

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

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