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tv   U.S. Senate U.S. Senate  CSPAN  February 13, 2023 2:59pm-7:17pm EST

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else's shoes and it's a respect even when there's a huge discussion about agreement. thank you all. >> thank you. certainly didn't k. you hear things like that, and again, the magic of
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jot u.s. senate is coming in for more debate on official nominations and debate on 5:30 eastern on whether to confirm cindy chung as u.s. court of appeals judge for the third circuit. live to the floor of the u.s. senate here on cspan2. the presiding officer: the senate will come to order. the chaplain will lead the senate in prayer. the chaplain: let us pray.
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awesome god who fills our hearts with songs of thanksgiving. each day we lift our hands in prayer to you, for you are alwas merciful. lord, thank you for blessing us each day. you have rescued us from dangers and kept our feet from slipping. you banish our worries and calm our fears. lord, thank you for your eagerness to forgive us and for your unfailig love. you alone are god. today, strengthen the members of this body.
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help them to trust you without wavering. teach them your ways, that they may live according to your trut. lord, give them purity of heart, that they may honor you. we pray in your great name. amen. the presiding officer: please join me in reciting the pledge f allegiance to our flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk
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will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c., february 13, 2023. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable tammy duckworth, a senator from the state of illinois, to perform te duties of the chair. signed: patty murray, president pro tempore. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. morning business is closed. under the previous order, the senate will proceed to executive session to resume consideration of the following nomination which the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. gina r. mendez-miro of puerto rico to be united states district judging for the district of puerto rico.
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a recent opinion piece for my
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fellow conservatives, don't hold hostage, the author of the piece, brian senior fellow at the hatton institute of former republican, good morning you. >> good morning. >> why did this appeal to your fellow conservatives on this topic? >> have been working with conservatives on capitol hill a lot on fiscal issues and i'm so pathetic to attach the forms of the debt limit. the eighth biggest deficit reduction deals since 1985 are all attached to debt limit, usually bipartisan but at the same time i don't think it's feasible to hold the debt limit hostage ultimately we cannot default on the debt. it would be catastrophic. the result is there's talk in republican circles well, what if we passed a bill that says if we hit the debt limit which means we have to cut spending 20% immediately to balance the budget, what if we just make sure we first pay interest on the debt, social security,
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military pay and maybe medicare and veteran health of the remaining 80% funded by tax revenue and cut out everything else. >> the prioritizing of that remark is called prioritizing, you will have to cut 20% of what 80% we paid is the most important. the problem is, it doesn't work. first, the treasury computers aren't designed to determine what bills to pay. they have millions of payment invoice in everyday. social security checks, food payments, they will just pay them in order, it doesn't matter pass a prioritization bill, they would just pay the bill in order until tax revenues run out because they can't borrow so if your social security check is you will get it.
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if your social security check is printed in the afternoon, he might not that day. that's not a good idea. his a lot of problems with prioritization. you're still defaulting on 20% of the government bills and also you are not fooling the economy in the bond market. the idea is we tell the people we owe that you will get your interest payments but just because you pay your credit card payments if you're not paying your mortgage and car payment, the credit companies will still notice and lower your credit limit so i'm trying to steer conservatives away from prioritization, it's not going to work. try to steer them away from talking about people and encourage a deal where conservatives say yes we will raise the debt limit no matter what. perhaps liberals say we will sit down for deficit reduction deal like we used to in the 80s and 90s when we raise the debt
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limit, that would be my kind of bipartisan deal on this. >> what do the contours of that deficit reduction look like? what you think in a divided congress right now? >> i think we have to be modest what can pass on the debt limit deal. as much as i would like social security and medicare reform, so they don't go bankrupt no one is talking seriously about that as a debt limit. some of the ideas of things like freezing discretionary spending for one year which is 30% of all spending echo through annual appropriations process like defense and health and education, it's grown 18% in the past two years, maybe year-to-year for limited growth, something modest like that. i'd like to see outreaching on the table, taxes and spending were a big deal but it seems like there's not much of an
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appetite right now for something on a debt limit so freezing discretionary spending for some democrats born with such limits, that might be a little more realistic. >> our guest senior fellow at the manhattan institute, former chief economist for former senator rob portman and with us until about 9:30 a.m. eastern so go ahead and start calling it. republicans (202)748-8001. independent 2027488002. it was president biden last week and the back-and-forth with republicans on the house floor who said after some back and forth medicare and social security are off the books. he said you'd like to reform social security and medicare, what does that mean? what does reforming look like? >> the problem right now, there's misconceptions like they don't contribute to the budget deficit, that's actually not
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true. this year payroll taxes and premiums do not cover all benefits. this year the federal government have to spend $420 billion from general revenue to pay social security and medicare. that annual transfer will go for 20 billion this year to 1.9 trillion that's why deficits are growing. over 30 years, medicare and social security face a shortfall of $116 trillion according to the congressional budget office. that's not my cap, that's the budget office, $116 trillion. that means in order just to pay all benefits we either need to raise taxes by $116 trillion, cut spending by $116 trillion or borrow $116 trillion.
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most of that is that it care. medicare is 80 trillion in short, social security is 36 trillion short and even if we save the trust fund, social security would be 33 trillion short set of 36 trillion short. what i would like to see members do is sit down and come up with everything on the table to make sure social security doesn't go insolvent in 11 years as scheduled and medicare doesn't solve it in five years. tweaking small changes to benefit now that might grow over time not taking anything from anybody like changes in the growth of benefits just to keep the programs going without having to double middle-class taxes, i'd love to see a deal with everything on the table. put taxes on the table, put programs on the table, put the fence on the table. we should all agree we don't want these programs to go insolvent or create $116
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trillion in deficit over ten years or 30 years. >> the productive dates of insolvency medicare expected to be insolvent by 2028, social security retiree fund would be by 2034 putting some dates with the numbers on social security specifically, cannot be fixed by raising the cap? remind viewers what raising the cap means. >> paying social security taxes on the $160,000 of what they earn, he don't pay social security taxes about that. the reason is because the designers of social security quantum a link how much you pay and to how much you get back. they didn't want people to pay much more than what they would get back so they wanted to link the two there are proposals in congress to raise the cap to
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basically say you pay social security taxes on income all the way up. if you do that, it would close about half of the long-term social security to put a couple of numbers on it. the social security deficit stabilizes about 1.8% of gdp by 2030s. getting rid of the cap eliminates 0.8% of gdp. 0.8 out of 1.8 cap, that could be part of the solution, it's only going to get you halfway there and that leaves things like the eligibility age and benefits for wealthy retirees that might be revisited to keep the system solvent. >> a question from chevelle on twitter this morning, why is there no talk about deficit and debt unless there's a democrat president? four years of extreme spending and one republican worried same with social security and medicare and same under both bushes and reagan. >> i wrote an article in the dispatch a couple weeks ago
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urging conservatives on deficits and one of the points i made is republicans seem to focus on deficit only during democratic residents. that is true, i'm not here to defend republic, i worked for republican senators but i'm an independent. republicans have done a bad job deficits under republican presidents, absolutely they are guilty and need to do a better job. that said, deficits have a problem under both presidents, deficits rose under president obama if you measure by legislation. under president obama all legislation hold $5 trillion in deficit over his presidency. under president trump, it was $7.8 trillion in deficit in four years. granted half of that was covid but what we see is if you measure by legislation which is what presidents control, we haven't had a president cut
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deficit going back decades and decades, a bipartisan problem but the argument is republicans only go after deficits under democratic presidents, i agree and i wish we go after deficit as a country during republican and democrat, that's my bias. >> how much debt is too much debt? the market economist debate this. right now it's about one 100% of the gdp which means that is the same size as national income. it's on pace to go to 185% d30 years according to the congressional budget office. interest rate rise, they could go to two or three 100% of gdp. here's why it is scary and how it is too much. as the debt goes to 185% of gdp, at that time if you assume interest rates of 5%, interest would take up half of your tax
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dollars in 30 years. if interest rates rise, interest would take 70 to one 100% of your tax dollars in the next couple decades. to me, that is too much debt when you have interest payments taking up half or more of your tax dollars which is on pace according to the congressional budget office, that's too much. beyond the federal budget component, there is a certain time where bond markets are going to keep laying washington money, they will see a debt growing out of control, they will see interest costs growing out of control and they will say what is lending you money low interest rates? we are not sure your house is in order. at a certain time the bond market says we don't want to lend you the money anymore. that's where you start to have a financial crisis, that's what we are trying to avoid. then that happens, no one really knows. it's as much about the
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psychology of the bond market as a number. this could happen in five years, 15 years, 20 years, we don't know. what economists can say is sometime between now and get to two, 2150% over the next 30 years, something has to give so we don't know when it's going to be and that's why i would like to do something about it now because once the bond market does enough and once they the solution is going to be more painful. >> a reminder u.s. national debt currently 31 trillion, 51,502,000,000,000 and counting according to u.s..org, a running real-time look at deficit. alex finkel, minnesota, independent.
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first color of with brian this morning. >> thank you for taking michael can you hear me? >> yes or you will thank you for talking about i think the national that is, i fully agree will be but i had a question about the strategy in terms of a clean list of the debt, passed in january congress human like people talk about only to cut spending to prevent changes spending of three why do you think republicans interested giving up the only one they had in terms of getting to a place where we can have a discussion about lowering and cutting spending? i will take michael off the air. >> thank you. i'm a fiscal conservative, i
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would like to seek spending cut deficit cut to limit think both parties have the responsibly to do so. again, the biggest deficit reduction loss is 1985 are attached to debt limit. when george raise taxes in 1990, the balanced budget act of 1997, president obama 2009, every one were attached to a debt limit increase. i'd love to see both parties from and they were going to raise the debt limit but attached reforms to fix the underlying problem. what i was saying earlier was if there is no deal, if a party can't come to a deal or democrats maintain their position we are not going to entertain deficit reduction right now, at that time i think republicans should responsibly raise the debt limit anyway because if they don't, the response of the economy and budget would be catastrophic.
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people say you take debt limit hostage but as a hostage you can't shoot so it's not real leverage if it's a hostage that would be catastrophic to shoot so i think conservatives should push for a deal and do everything they can but if they can't get one, i think not raising the debt limit i think is too catastrophic of a response as much as i want a deal, i think that would be something they would come to regret and people would be hurting economy. >> was the next best leverage then? >> there isn't much leverage right now, there's always government shutdowns at the end of the year with appropriations but that usually doesn't work well either. what scares me about the deficit is there really is no moment of pure leverage where lawmakers have to do anything about it. the only real moment of leverage will come from the bond market and they decide to stop funding washington money and say forget
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it, we don't think you're good for this anymore, we are going to cut you off. that's the only time congress will have or someone else will have real leverage over congress. by the time you get there, you are in deep trouble already so the thing that keeps me up at night is trying to find something with real leverage going to motivate a deal in congress but not do something catastrophic like the debt limit. i hope it doesn't get to where the financial market essentially cuts us off but that is my fear. >> this is joseph, line for democrats. good morning. >> good morning. i have a couple of comments i like to make. the first one is figures don't lie but liars do know how to figure. how many years has social
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security run a surplus? where did that surplus go? right into the channel fund so how much interest was earned by the social security department for letting the money be used for other things within the federal government? inexcusable. now you're going to say you're out of money so you've got to pay up. well, you stole from us for years so i'm not buying that. second, corporate greed. i get the scriptures, five prescriptions on -- i'm 69 years old. i have great health insurance but i pay dearly for it. an example, every prescription i get because i have good insurance, i only pay about $15
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for a 90 day supply. if you look at the usual customary charge, they are saying it's 110120, $200, whatever. if i don't have good insurance, that's what the drug companies would be paying. making record profits. we are trying to address the fact that billionaires don't pay a penny and i am tired of it. people should pay their fair share and when able pay their fair share, then we will have money to spend on other things. >> take the two topics of. >> social security ran a 3 trillion-dollar surplus from 1983 to 2009, the surplus was rated by congress and spent it. what that means is the social security is now entitled by law to run 3 trillion-dollar deficit in 2010 -- 2034.
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in order to balance the surplus that was rated. everybody agrees is going to be allowed to run a 3 trillion-dollar deficit and they will get paid back. nobody disagrees with that. the problem is social security shortfall over the next 30 years is $36 trillion so even if he gets repaid the 3 trillion, it's so facing 36 trillion-dollar shortfall and even if that we trillion had been saved which it wasn't, you still have 33 trillion-dollar shortfall so everybody agrees social security is going to get bonds paid back granted they are paid back out of the taxes but the problem is social security deficit is so much bigger than social security shortfall. taxing the rich, i think everything should be on the table absolutely, we should put taxes on the table, entitle it social security, medicare, defense, everything on the
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table. that being said, you can't get there just by taxing the rich. the amount of money you would need to pay for social security and medicare, $116 trillion, if you see every penny by billionaires, that's 5 trillion and we need $116 trillion for social security and medicare. i'm not saying don't tax the rich, i'm not saying don't put it on the table but the reality is if you want to just raise taxes to pay for shortfalls, just taxing the rich is mathematically impossible to close the gap. generally you have to have middle-class taxes, york pays for its social insurance mostly middle-class tax because even if you tax the rich one 100% it wouldn't be enough. i'm not saying don't tax the rich but have to be realistic it's not going to spare the
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middle class for tax increases to pay for spending. >> how do we get proposals from what we have heard the federal government looking at military spending as to areas members proposed on this program? >> very low. waste fraud and abuse is easy to complain about and hard to define. easy to get rid of, they would have got rid of it by now but you have to build a new system to root out ways. you can probably get about $100 billion, 200 billion in waste, fraud and abuse. a deficit that 1 trillion rising to 2.7 trillion. for defense, the defense budget is $8 billion. it's already in a share of the economy and a share of the budget. defense is roughly 13% of the budget, the lowest it's been in a long time, one of the slowest growing --
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it. the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: losing a child is the hardest thing that can ever happen to a parent. it's out of the natural order. madam president, those are the words of a grieving father in bowling green, kentucky, after struggling for years against opioid addiction, his son was killed by a lethal dose of fentanyl in 2021. that year marked a second straight year in which overdose deaths in the commonwealth set a new all-time record. thousands of lives are now claimed each year by a scourge of deadly drugs. last week i met with narcotics officers from across kentucky who work on the front lines of this crisis. they told me that rampant flows of illicit drugs have driven the price of a pound of fentanyl down to less than a third of
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what it costs dealers in 2020. that's right, working families are paying more for just about everything on president biden's watch, but drug dealers with unpress depthed access to massive -- unprecedented access to massive flows of foreign drugs are literally making out like bandits. the one thing that's gotten cheaper under this administration is the last thing we want americans buying. the officers were crystal clear on the bottom line -- they won't be able to beat the fentanyl crisis until washington decides to do something about the southern border crisis. last fiscal year customs and border protection apprehended 14,700 pounds of fentanyl, and just a third of the way through the current fiscal year they're already seized another 12,500 pounds. but the growing death toll from fentanyl-related overdose tells us that more than enough of this lethal drug is still flowing
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unchecked. kentucky isn't the only state losing thousands of its people to lethal drugs produced by china and shipped in by mexican cartels. since the biden administration has ignored a functionally open southern border, every state in america has faced border-state problems. last fiscal year customs and border protection apprehended more than 2.7 million illegal immigrants. that was far and away the highest annual count they had ever seen. without a coherent, coordinated response from the biden administration, front line states from florida to texas to arizona have had to take the response to catch and release into their own hands. these states have dealt with soaring arrivals by busing so-called immigrants into the
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interior. colorado's democratic governor followed suit. cvp estimates that 1.2 million more people crossed the border and got away since president biden took office. 1.21.2 million got waist. -- gottaways. thatso, madam president, 98 of e illegal immigrants cvp apprehended, 98 of them were watch list terrorists. thousands were convicted criminals and along with them as kentucky narcotics officers understand all too well came million upon million lethal doses of fentanyl. i'm proud of the first
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responders who are fighting back against this killer, but until the biden administration addresses the border crisis, my fellow kentuckians will continue to fight a steep uphill battle. now, on an entirely different matter. there is something unusual going on in our nation's skies. president biden needs to communicate and level with the american people. about two weeks ago the american people learned that a chinese spy balloon had crossed into our airspace and was taking its time surveying our homeland. we watched a big tour of it before the biden administration belatedly took it down. since then, the public has seemingly heard about another new unidentified flying object seemingly on a daily basis. yesterday one of our f-16's shot
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down they still haven't identified near lake huron. an american f-22 shot down something else over the yukon. the day before that, we took out something else over alaska. the administration has still not been able to i divulge any meaningful information about what was shot down. what in the world going on? has the biden administration dimed the sensitivity -- dialed the sensitivity of our radars all the way up? if so, what are the objects we're noticing for the first time? are they benign science projects or something more nefarious that we have been missing all this time. president biden owes the american people some answers. what are we shooting down? where did they come from?
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whether they are hostile or not is there coherent guidance about when to shoot them down? if they knew all along about china's surveillance, why didn't they shoot it down before it crossed the country? did they know about this surveillance threat? did od and i or dod not share intelligence about the growing threat. how did we get into pa position where the greatest nation in the world doesn't know what is tra vesting our own airspace. how long has the domain awareness gap that the general has identity existed? what has the department done about it? the commander in chief owes the country some answers. now, on one final matter.
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this morning i was saddened to learn of of the passing of my gd friend ted turner. when he bought the nationals in 2006, he helped a home town team plant deep roots for the first time in 33 years and season by season, his leadership built the team that brought home washington's first world series title in nearly a century. true nat fans consider our ourss lucky, but even in a transient place like washington, the whole city has been touched by the lerner family story. ted was a washingtonian from the
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beginning. after serving in the army after world war ii, he met his wife here and every step of the way ted's success was a family affair. he got a front-row seat to the enter priding working spirit of his immigrant parents. he got a start in real estate with a loan from none other than annette who at the time had the only paying job between them and the family they have built together has been involved in every venture that transformed the d.c. skyline and put the dome over left center field. our prayers are with the learner family -- lerner family. mr. durbin: madam president. the presiding officer: the senior senator from illinois. mr. durbin: i don't know what's
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up in the skies, what's going around, flying around being spotted and i think there are a lot of questions that need to be answered. if it's a threat to the united states in any way, shape or form, it's unacceptable and i think both political parties agree. when we start giving advice to this president and the department of defense in these matters, we have to stop and reflect on the manager of my local car wash in springfield, illinois. i went there about a week ago when the first balloon was spotted and he said, senator, what's going on up there? i said i don't know, i think china's responsible for it. he said, what are they trying to tell us? and i said whatever it is, we better answer decisively. we don't want any country flying into our airspace and endangering america. and he said, what about the
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cowboys who want to shoot it down anywhere? are they thinking about what will happen if that debris of whatever it is if it falls on oa city, hospital, school playground? they don't want to do that, do they, senator? i hope they don't. when i listen to the comments of some people here who argue we should have shot down that balloon when it was going across the united states, if they reflect on what would have been the collateral damage. we didn't know what was in the balloon. it was the size of three school buses and whether it was anything dangerous to us, radioactive or some sort of explosive, we didn't know. we did the right thing. we waited until it was off the atlantic coast, still near our own territorial waters, shot it down and now we're recovering what is in it. as for the other elements, we
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will be briefed by china and i will be there as a bipartisan basis as i was last week. it's serious and we ought to take take it seriously. but the notion that we should have shot it down over louisville, kentucky or springfield, illinois or chicago that's not responsible. it madam president, on a separate topic, i want to talk about a friend of mine who just passed away. he was a selfless son of chicago who did a lot of good for a lot of people. sean o'shay was a political science major at depaul. he was an intern under president clinton. there was a beautiful obituary in the "chicago sun-times." the first line reads, sean o'shay had an endearing quality
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that served as a lock picking device on doors from his southside home all the way to the white house. his first boss recalled his first impressions. i'll substitute some of the colorful language. he said, quote, i'm not exaggerating, that guy walked into our office and within the first day we were like, who the bleep is this kid? he is amazing. he stood out from every intern we had. he was like a mentorship. i know what i'm doing here, and he wasn't kidding. people would ask, how old is he and i would tell them, you don't want to know. he was the son of irish immigrants and he was funny and personal and a real doer. everyone in the white house from the clintons on done fell in love with sean o'shay. after graduating, he was offered
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a full-time job between the white house an several cabinet agencies. after the white house, he served as top aide to senator hillary clinton and handled infrastructure. he went back home to illinois to serve as deputy chief of staff to the former governor, overseeing tens of thousands of capital improvement projects. he helped to pass marriage equality. maybe he packed so much in a short span because he would not be given the gift after long life. he passed away from brain cancer at the age of 46. sean francis patrick o'shay grew up on the southside of chicago. his parents were both born in ireland and they met at a dance
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in chicago. like many immigrant parents, joe and mary taught their kids to be proud of their heritage and to be grateful they were americans. sean's dad worked at the water department. and joe o'shay was an accordion player and was a member of the irish musicians association who insisted that all four of his children learn irish dancing. in 2000, sean was asked if he could recommend any irish musicians to play at president t clinton's final st. patrick days. sean also was that rare south southsider who was a chicago cubs fan. he was a regular at cubs spring
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training with his friends from television and radio. he never missed the big game which ranged from opening day to game seven of the world series to any random tuesday. he loved the sport and wrigley field and experience with his family and friends. sean was proud to have helped make carrie wood cubs field which has given countless children a chance to play baseball. he also loved people. sean's husband said they could go into a restaurant or bar where no one either of them and by the time they left, sean knew everyone. as one of sean's friends said, he left every room better than when he came in. but what sean loved most of all was helping others many he was a
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good, honorable man who believed that government could make life better for people and public service was a privilege. he could often be heard saying, how can i help? he had a tremendous impact on the lives of people in chicago, illinois, and beyond. his contributions will make a difference for years to come and he'll be deeply missed. sean's funeral mass was held at st. pat's parish in chicago. it was packed with his friends countless people whose lives he touched. the last song they played, of course wags an irish -- was an irish tune called the parting glass. it includes the lines, come fill to me the parting glass, good night and joy be with you all. that is how sean would want to be remembered. as a man who made the world better and brought joy to so
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many people. loretta and i send our deepest condolences to his husband, his mother mary, his siblings, and his niece and nephew and to his friends, too numerous to count, may you find comfort in your memory. madam president, i ask that the next statement i'm about to make be placed in a separate part of the record. are. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: they say to be an effective senator, you've got to be patient. but what i'm about to describe tests that theory. it's been 22 years since i introduced the deem act. -- dream act. the best -- the majority leader talked about the horrors of fentanyl and recount the number of people showing up at our borders as well. is brat back my themry of the
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gang of eight, four republicans, four democrats including john mccain, lindsey graham, senator flake, senator rubio, senator schumer, senator bennet of colorado and senator men then december and -- senator menendez and myself. we worked for almost a year to put together comprehensive immigration reform, long overdue, and it included border security at a level unseen in america ever. we were prepared to invest billions of dollars to make our border safe. we passed this bill with, i think, 678 votes here -- 68 votes here on the floor of the senate. i thought finally, after 30 years of talking about immigration, and batting it back and forth between democrats and republicans, we're finally going to do something on a bipartisan basis. we took that measure, sent it over to the republican-led house of representatives. they refused to even consider it. refused to consider it.
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so when i hear concerns and complaints today that our border just isn't safe enough, i agree. but i ask those who are complaining where were you when we brought this bipartisan measure to the floor which had so much enforcement in it and really would have given us a safer situation today and for years to come. we can do that again. i agree completely with senator mcconnell. the drug crisis in america is serious, not just in kentucky, in my state of illinois and yours too and all across this nation. i also understand that there are too many people presenting themselves at the border believing that they're going to some-hour find their -- somehow find their way into this country. i have met many of them that were brought on buses to the city of chicago. you should hear their stories. these are not people who are out trying to deceive the system or cheat the laws of america. they are desperate people, desperate for the safety of themselves and their children,
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desperate for an opportunity to have hope in the future. you sit down with them and think, how can they be much different than my mother who is an immigrant to this country at the age of 2, came here with her family looking for a better life. she found it and because she found it, i did, too. that story is the story of america. immigration is the story of america. and the notion that some republicans have that we will not accept one more immigrant is ridiculous. and it's un-american. and it doesn't reflect the reality of the country we live in. 22 years ago i heard a story about a young lady, young woman, in the city of chicago. she was from correa. her name was teresa, came here on a visitors visa, overstayed the visa and was technically until documented, illegal in the eyes of law. her father wanted to have a church. he wanted to be a korean pastor
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of a church in chicago. he never quitersed his dream but visited a lot of churches and dragged his little daughter along with him. while he was talking things over with the pastors of these churches about what he might do, she would wander around the church and eventually get to the piano and sit down and start banging away at the keys. she wasn't good to start with but there was promise there and became part of the merit music program in chicago. this is a program which is remarkable. the lady left a lot of money and said use that money to train kids in the public schools to play musical instruments. teresa lee was one of those kids. she learned how to play the piano and became one of the best. the day came when she was finally urged to take a chance and to apply for music school. and she did. but she answered one of the
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questions on the application out of high school and the question was what is your citizenship status. she said to her mother, what is it? her mom said, we never filed any papers. i don't know. she said what are we going to do? they said we're going to call durbin. so they called my office and got in touch with my chief of staff who was working those cases at the time. we checked the law. and for this 18-year-old girl, the law was clear. she was illegal in america and she had to leave for ten years and then apply to come back in. it didn't seem right. she didn't make the decision to come to this country. her parents did. verything right once they got here and struggled with a family that didn't have a lot of money and managed to scrape by. and here she was asking for a chance to continue her education from chicago public schools to music school that might make a difference in her life and she was being told officially by the government no thanks. that's when i decided to
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introduce a bill called the dream act 22 years ago. for more than 20 years now, hundreds of thousands of young people in this country have been waiting for congress to pass this bill. i've been waiting, too. along the way there have been some victories and some major setbacks but through it all, one thing has remained steady and constant. the devotion of dreamers to this country. dreamers have woven themselves into the fap rick of america. -- fap rick of america. -- fabric of america. many were brought here as babies. they grew up alongside other kids, our kids. they pledged allegiance to the same american flag that we all do. and they did it in classrooms day after day. and over the past 22 years, dreamers have given everything they can to america again and again. they've served our nation as doctors, teachers, members of the military, and other essential roles that have helped
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move america forward. and that's why last week i reintroduced the dream act for what i hope is the final time and we can see its pass annual. i want to thank one -- passage. i want to thank one person in particular. senator lindsey graham. he has joined me again and again as my republican cosponsor of this measure. i can never thank him enough. this legislation will finally provide permanent protections to every dreamer who's grown up in america and earn their path to citizenship. more than 800,000 dreamers have received protection from president obama's deferred action for child arrivals program known as daca. the president initiated that in 2012. that's quite a few years ago now. it was never meant to be a permanent solution. it was supposed to be a bridge until congress finally acted on immigration. we're still waiting. what's more, there are thousands of other dreamers who can never have the chance to apply for daca protection. instead have to be forced to
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remain in the shadow. let me show you two that really demonstrate this story. this is karen and judith, twin sisters. theirs is the 132nd and 133rd dreamer story i've told on the senate floor. it's a lot. karen and judith were born in durango, mexico. they arrived in the u.s. when they were 2 years old, same age when my mom came here as an aim grant and they settled in dallas. growing up their parents were loving and supportive but karen and judith faced some obstacles because they were undocumented. for instance, they didn't have health insurance which meant doctor and dental appointments were reserved only for emergencies. by the time karen and judith reached high school, it became clear that they would not be given the same opportunities as the kids they went to school
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with. they could only watch from afar as their friends got their driver's licenses, traveled outside the country, landed their first jobs. karen and judith were not in that category. they were undocumented. but despite the frustrations they pushed onward. let me tell you what happened. in addition to graduating as salutatorian and valedictorian, they became junior rotc, academic bowl national qualifiers, ap scholars with distinction, national hispanic scholars, national honor society inductees and so much more. really their academic accomplishments i can't even start to list. but because of their immigration status, karen and judith could not apply for financial aid or scholarships of colleges at the top of their list. upon graduating high school they stayed close to home where the two are currently attending
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texas a&m. both of them hope to pursue careers in medicine. do we need more medical professionals? the question answer itself. but for now in their spare time, both sisters give back to their community when they can. karen tutors schoolkids and provides in-home care for seniors. judith volunteers at a local hospital as well as an interfaith immigration network. really that should be the end of their story for now, but it's not. you see, a couple of years ago karen and judith's paths diverged, twins though they may be. not by choice but because of our broken immigration system. what do i mean? in 2020 karen and judith submitted their applications for daca, but they did so one day apart. a year or so later karen's application was approved. but before judith even received a reply to her application filed
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one day later, a federal judge in texas, judge hannan, decided to hit the brakes for the daca program. he ruled that the uscis could not approve any daca applications after his decision. judith has been living in limbo ever since that decision was handed down. she cannot legally work and she has no idea what her future holds. ask yourself the simple question, would america be better if these two sisters were deported back to durango, mexico? will we be any better if karen and judith are sent to a country they don't even remember? what about the more than 200,000 daca recipients who worked on the front lines of this pandemic? doctors, nurse, paramedics? would america be better without them? of course not. we need dreamers like karen and judith and this congress needs to do something to protect them. think about this for a moment.
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karen and judith weren't even alive when i first introduced the dream act in 2001. while they've grown up and gone on to change their lives, congress has still not fixed the broken immigration system. even daca, a temporary solution for dreamers like karen and judith has endured one bad faith attack after another, republican governors like texas greg abbott have led a relentless campaign to eliminate daca and deport these two young women and disrupt the lives of hundreds of thousands of dreamers in america. last october the fifth circuit issued a ruling on daca. the court kept protections in place for now for current recipients, but sent the case back to a judge in texas who has repeatedly ruled against the program, the same judge hannan. and just recently nine republican-led states asked that same judge to end daca in their states altogether. that would be a disaster for
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this country. not just in terms of the human cost, the economic costs, and what it says about our values. daca recipients and their households pay more than $5 billion in federal taxes each year. that's money for repairing roads and bridges, social security, medicare, and medicaid. and by enacted the dream act, we would increase america's gdp by nearly $800 billion over the next ten years and create hundreds of thousands of jobs in the process. the bottom line is we can point fingers at other people, but this ball is in our court, and there are other immigration issues we should address. senator mcconnell raised earlier, border security is one of them. we need to bring order to our nation's border. we should never knowingly allow anyone dangerous come to or stay in this country, and we cannot absorb all the people in the world who want to become citizens or residents tomorrow.
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we have to have a thoughtful system that makes sense for america's future and our economy. it's worth noting that president biden has made some progress. even with the limitations of a willfully -- woefully outdated immigration system, the biden administration has developed a more efficient process that is starting to make a difference. that new process has helped reduce the number of migrant crossings from cuba, haiti, nick -- nicaragua, and venezuela by 97%. it's progress but executive action can't get the job done on its own. poll after poll shows americans of all stripes, liberal, conservative, democrat, republican, independent want congress to do something instead of making teachers on the floor. in fact, one recent poll showed an overwhelming majority of americans, democrats, independents, and republicans support both protections for dreamers and improving border
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security. i want to put that in writing. we're going to put together a bill that addresses border security and the future of the dream act, and we need to do it soon. if we've learned anything from last year's election, it's america wants us to come together on a bipartisan basis to make our nation stronger, safer, more prosperous, and really reflect the values of the american people. i can think of no better place to start than the dream act. let's work together to protect our brave young dreamers from deportation and bring order to america's southern border. there is no other option. madam president, i yield the floor.
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>> democrat pull service connected carly and republican pulser brian nemer join us to discuss the top political stories of the week and views on government. welcome brian and carly. >> thank you. >> thank you for having us. >> thank you, thank yous. let's start off with president biden's state of the union last week. carly, i want to start with you. how would you rate it? what do you think were the strengths and weaknesses he displayed during that speech? >> president biden's state of the union was very strong. he was spirited. he came off as in charge. he reminded his audience of his accomplishments over the past two years, taking our country and economy out of a global pandemic and laid out his most popular points of his agenda going forward for the next two years. he reminded people he was going
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to stand firm on positions on spending for the negotiations over the debt ceiling and no cuts over social security and medicare will be on the table. he was able to paint the republican leaders, people in the house as chaotic and extreme in the way they responded when he spoke about social security and medicare with the boos and cheers and really able to come off like an adult in the room. show what he was willing to and eager to govern over the next two years hopefully with bipartisan fashion. >> brian, what did you think about the speech, in particular that whole >> both had national bolling out in president and congress not taking action on items that matter and there's too much in finding and too much
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partisanship and make the centerpiece singling out this thing from one senator release from sunsetting programs and a program that president biden self-supporting in the legislation that's four years instead of five to propose. to them using that sort of based on the more colorful republican members being upset. it's just disappointing not to see someone that's more willing to lead. these are real problems and we had leaders on today and programs will go broke if we don't take serious action and have the demagogue and use the polling position. >> we want to get to calls from our audience again for your questions or comments on the news of the week, questions for carly cooperman, democratic pollster or brian nienaber, republican pollster.
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call us on the republican or democrat line. (202)748-8000 for democrat and if you're an independent call us at (202)748-8002 and we'll get to some of your calls in just a moment. let's talk a bit more about that portion of the state of the union. president biden and republicans shouting out lie, liar, when he talked about provisions that would sunset federal law, proposal frank siller senator rick scott particularly. this is an article that said how the house gop blew up at biden's state of the union and starts out by saying speaker kevin mccarthy said republicans would not play "childish games" during biden's state of the union address on tuesday and started by a cord yule event by the end, the speech had some of the
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rowdiest roweddutch >> i think when you e kevin mctar think and he doesn't want to put things on the table like cutting social security and medicare and call earlier from them with senator with the public setting group of members with a group of republicans that
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said the same and fighting over something that doesn't exist is a poise in everybody's time instead of looking for a real solution. >> carly, you also recently cowrote a piece on the hill, headline, america's distrust of washington is a five alarm political crisis so what are -- why are public attitudes towards government getting worse. is there anything congress can do to find of fix perception they say. >> yeah, that's right. poll -- ubstance of my remarks, some legislative business. i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion to proceed. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar number 10. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion.
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all those in favor, say aye. all those, no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. ana c.reyes. district of columbia for united states district judge for the district of columbia. mr. schumer: i send a cloture motion to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 10, ana c. reyes of the district of columbia to be united states district judge for for the district of columbia, signed by 18 senators as follows -- mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move proceed to to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no.
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the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider be calendar number 11. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. daniel j. calabretta of california to be united states district judge for the eastern district of california. mr. schumer: send a cloture motion to the desks. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 11, daniel j. calabretta of california to be united states district judge for the eastern district of california, signed by 18 senators as follows -- mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived.
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the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar number 1. the presiding officer: all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk although report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, department of defense, lester martinez-lopez of florida to be an assistant secretary of defense. mr. schumer: i send a cloture motion to otodesk. -- to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the
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nomination of executive calendar number 1, lester martinez-lopez of florida to be an assistant secretary of defense, signed by 18 senatorsals follows -- mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar number. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. maria araujo kahn. mr. schumer: i send a motion
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to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of executive calendar number of, maria araujo kahn, signed by 18 senators as follow -- mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: finally, i ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum calls for the cloture motions filed today, february 13 is be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: now, for my remarks, madam president, first and foremost, i begin today as happy as i could possibly be. last week by daughter allison and her wife celebrated the birth of little henry, their first child, my third grandchild. the tie i'm wearing today is the very same tie i wore on the day my daughter and her wife got married. the last time i wore this same tie on the floor of the senate was the day the respect for
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marriage act passed the senate. so it's not only a great tie but it's a great day and symbolizes a whole lot. i want to thank everyone for their messages of support. i'm pleased to report both moms and the baby are doing just great. he is such a little cutie. few things put this job in sper speck alternative like being are a -- perspective like being a grandparent. after noah was born, i took a bike ride on coney island. on the southern shore of brooklyn. it's beautiful. i love that ride. two weeks after noah was born it hit me like a bolt. will noah get to enjoy this beautiful, beautiful bike path like i have. because if the ocean rises even a few inches, this bike path will be gone. having grandkids like that reminds you of what we're fighting for. for a better life for them, a better globe for them, better world for them.
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it's a motivation unlike any other. i could go on, but suffice it to say that today chuck schumer is one happy grandparent and i'm grateful for everyone's kind words over the past few days. now on another subject, over the weekend u.s. forces shot down three unknown objects that entered u.s. and canadian airspace that were deemed to pose a potential threat to civilian aviation. at the moment we only have preliminary details. i have scheduled for senators to receive a briefing tomorrow on what we know and do not know about where these objects come from and what threats, if any, they pose to the united states. so that's tomorrow. i believe, and my office can check me on this, it will be at 10:00 a.m., but we'll send a notice out. i commend president biden and all our servicemembers who acted quickly to shoot these objects
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down before they dangered american aircraft or civilians. unlike the balloon shot down last week, these objects demanded a swift response to ensure they didn't get in the way of commercial jets or pose any other risk on the ground. the american people can rest assured that our defense and intelligence agencies are focused like a laser to determine where these objects came from and what their capabilities were. and while there's still plenty that we don't know about this past weekend's events, in the case of the chinese balloon, we do know now that it was not the first time chinese surveillance balloons entered united states airspace. it has been confirmed that three balloons flew over the united states during the previous administration without detection. china's deployment of these balloons is brazen. i bring this up to emphasize that this issue is bigger than any one administration and should be free from partisan
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sniping. congress is going to conduct a careful bipartisan examination at these various incidents and also look into why u.s. authorities didn't find these chinese surveillance balloons sooner. my friend, senator tester, has been taking the lead in this effort. i want to commend him for his leadership. and so as we recover the items shot down over the weekend, i once again commend the president and i fully support the senate taking a thorough look at finding out why it took so long to find these balloons. it is something we must do because, as i mentioned, three of them occurred during the trump administration, and the authorities knew nothing about them. i finally want to thank our servicemembers for their excellent work, and congress is going to work in the coming weeks to get the full story of what happened and how we keep the american people safe. now on the debt ceiling, last
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week president biden distilled a sharp contrast between the democratic and republican approaches to the debt ceiling, and in the days since that republicans have made that contrast even sharper. democrats have been clear about our position, very clear, crystal clear. we must raise the debt ceiling cleanly in a bipartisan fashion without blackmail or brinkmanship or hostage taking. house republicans have taken a different and far more dangerous approach. rather than affirm the need to raise the debt ceiling together, house republicans are trying to force the rest of the country into a perilous game of chicken, threatening to withhold their support for lifting the debt ceiling unless everyone agrees to spending cuts first. but to this day, madam president, to this day, despite more than a month of questioning, house republicans won't answer one question --
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what cuts do they want? where is their plan? house republicans, where is your plan? i say to house republicans, enough with the games. show us your plan. you say you want cuts, well, what are they? you have an obligation not only to show us, but the american people what they are. these could be quite dangerous to tens of millions, even hundreds of millions of americans. our house republicans -- are house republicans going to put social security and medicare on the table in is exchange for the debt ceiling? last week republicans erupted like whiled -- wild hornets during the state of the union when president biden pointed out the obvious, that many in their own party have been open about wanting to target security and medicare, rick scott being among them, and he was the leader of the national republican senate campaign committee. but listen to this one.
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if you think this is just a few people, a few dangerous people doing this -- dangerous on social security and medicare, that is -- the republican study committee, which includes a majority, a majority of house republicans, at least half -- this is not some fringe group, but half of the entire house conference released a budget last year that proposed raising social security retirement age, cutting benefits to certain recipients, and even privatizing some parts of social security. let me say that again because this -- i don't know if it's been reported but it's astounding. the republican study committee, including a majority of house republicans, released a budget just last year that proposed raising the social security retirement age, cutting benefits to certain recipients, and even privatizing some parts of social security. and almost as if to prove
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president biden correct, senator johnson of wisconsin reacted to the state of the union by going on radio and calling for annual votes on social security, calling it a ponzi scheme. let me say that one again too. according to wisconsin's public radio, senator johnson last week openly called social security a ponzi scheme before bemoaning the failed attempt to privatize the program during the bush administration. a, it's an incredible example of how out of touch maga republicans are from average americans. and, b, it shows that this idea that republicans don't want to cut social security is not at all clear, no matter what speaker mccarthy says. there are too many in his ranks who either are calling for it now or have called for it in the recent past. we democrats are not going to stop fighting until this plan bubbling up in republican
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quarters even now to cut social security, to cut medicare is dead, d-e-a-d. so it brings us back to the $64,000 question, are republicans going to target social security and medicare? until republicans actually show us their plan, we simply can't take them at their word that social security and medicare won't be touched because the record over the last few years clearly shows that many of them are open to doing just that, cutting it. now on judges, this week the senate will reach a significant milestone by confirming the 99th and 100th federal judge of the biden administration. we'll begin today with cindy chung, nominee number 99, to serve as a circuit court judge for the third circuit. if confirmed, ms. chung would be the first asian american judge to sit on the third circuit. that should make us all proud. cindy chung is precisely the
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kind of person we want on the federal bench. she's dedicated her career to protecting civil rights, having prosecuted white supremacists and others charged with hate crimes. later today we'll also vote to proceed with gina r. mendez-miro as district judge in the district of puerto rico. judge mendez-miro would make history as the first lgbt american to preside in the puerto rican district court. very quickly i want to mention last week's vote on deandrea gist benjamin, owned the sect -- the second woman of color to serve on the fourth circuit. i had to miss her vote because of the birth of my grandson but i would have proudly voted to confirm her. the nominations of deandrea gist benjamin and cindy chung are significant for many reason. for one, the lion's share of all federal cases are ultimately decide at the circuit court level so filling these vacancies with judges like ms. benjamin and chung are essential.
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second, despite their importance circuit courts have lagged well behind other courts in terms of diversity. we want these courts, so vital, so powerful, to represent america, all of america, not just some of it. ms. benjamin and ms. chung will help remedy that with their unique experiences and much-needed perspectives on the law. senate democrats have focused intensely on expanding the diversity of our courts and not just in terms of demographics, madam president, but in terms of experience, professional experience too. we're working hard not only to add more women, more people of color, more lawyers from unique backgrounds to the bench, but people of different walks of life. ketanji brown jackson was the first legal aide attorney to serve on the supreme court. after all these years that perspective had not been on the court. now it is. why do we want this, these kinds of diversity? it's simple. when americans present their cases before these courts, they
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should trust that they'll get a fair shake in the dispensation of justice. the more our courts reflect the country at large in terms of backgrounds and experiences, the greater that trust will be in the long run. ms. benjamin, ms. chung, ms. mendez-miro are exawms of the kind of judges who will strengthen that trust. i congratulate each of them on their nominations. thank chairman durbin and the members of the judiciary committee for moving these individuals quickly through the nominations process and yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from yam. mr. tuberville: thank you, madam president. before i get into my topic of my speech today, i put a tweet out
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about what i think about the surveillance, the balloons which are very, very concerning, being on the armed services committee. the chinese surveillance over our skies are very concerning, but also the fentanyl from china pouring across our borders every day that are killing 300 americans a day. that's also very concerning. and also the 800% increase in chinese nationals crossing our border every day. so i think we've got a lot of problems other than just balloons flying around our sky. we need to recognize that. we need to start understanding we have an adversary in china that is our biggest, and the president of the united states, he obviously needs to protect our air, but he needs to protect our borders. we're having people die every day. what's most important? the most important thing is protecting the sovereignty of our country. and that's our borders and the
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sky, and protecting our people on the ground, especially from this deadly drug. i just wanted to say that before i get into my speech because i know it's important. china is our number-one adversary, and we need to start watching every part of it instead of watching these balloons flying around the sky that we have no clue of what they're doing or why they're here. so, madam president, my democratic colleagues frequently say conservatives are radical in order to score political points. even president biden has used his office to attack conservatives with language i won't give more air time by repeating here at this time. liberals do this to scare americans into ignoring the failures of their own policies. and distract voters from how extreme they've come. this was on full display in last week's state of the union
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address as president biden misled the country about republican ideas and straight-up twisted the facts of his own agenda. president biden sold the state of the nation as perfectly fine, ignoring many of the issues americans care most about. the reality is president biden and my colleagues on the far left are sometimes way, way out of touch with american people believe in. democrats frequently reject commonsense proposals, but support extreme policies put forth by the far, far left wing. they are aligned with a woke mob that will cancel them if they disagree. although that far-left mob is very vocal, they don't represent
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the vast majority of americans. but sadly president biden's position on the border, the economy, crime, and energy have all fallen victim to this trap set by the progressive ideas of the left and his administration is set on taking this country apart from the inside-out. we're sighing from the inside -- dying from the inside out with socialist ideas that will not ever work in the united states of america. democrats are misusing the federal government to get their way regardless of what the law, the constitution or the american people have to say. no issue shows the radical drift of this administration better than abortion. a very tough and a very
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important topic. the far left attacks pro-life americans and they distract from the fact that their views that go well beyond the beliefs of most americans and most civilized people around the world. the biden administration reports an extreme, heartless and inhumane abortion agenda. the democrats today believe in abortion at any time for any reason with no restrictions or regard for human life. i am proud to be pro-life for many reasons, including my faith, another thing that i will not set aside for political correctness. however, even without considering religion, a society that allows abortion up to and passed the moment of birth after the baby has been born isn't progressive, it's barbaric and
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it's murder. when the supreme court ruled that abortion should be left up to the people, this administration went into overdrive to force their agenda on to every american. now, to be clear, the supreme court ruling did not make abortion illegal. it said, we're going to send it back to the states where it can be more closely decided by the voters. let the voters decide it. that's how we do it in the united states of america because it's an issue that should not be left up to the federal government or to a court. the people should decide it. that's what we should do here. that's what we've always done. the biden administration is attempting to use, at this time now, our military, our veterans' affairs facilities, your taxpayer dollars, maybe even a ridiculous new public health emergency in the very future to go at this agenda all to make sure there is unrestricted
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access to ending the life of an unborn child. that is extreme. let's look at how this administration is trying to skirt the law and ignore the supreme court and how it will impose the law. last summer the department of defense claimed that the decision to overturn roe would have serious impacts on our military readiness. extreme impacts. of course they provided no real evidence to back up this claim. but, as usual, they laid out a radical plan to use our military resources to fly folks around the country to get abortions on taxpayer money. american taxpayers are expected to pay for time off, support, and travel costs for service members and their dependents. for years the military has funded abortions in three different cases, rape, incest,
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and a threat to the life of the mother. the new policy that the department of defense wants to put forward throws all those restrictions out the door and opens military-fafa till stated- facilitated abortions to millions and millions more people. it's ridiculous, it's against the law and they know it and that's why they refuse to answer questions directed by members of congress when we doubted these plans. the department of defense stonewalled -- stonewalled all of our requests for a brief for months this past fall, only giving us answers after i held up nominations to force their hand they were forced to do it. those answers were shocking once we had the briefing. the department of defense
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leaders claimed overturning roe would severely impact military readiness, but the department has averaged less than 20 abortions per year for many, many years. averaged only 20. so does this potentially restricting less than 20 procedures a year sound like a threat to our military readiness? it does not. this isn't about readiness, it's about politics. the new policy would put pt american people on the -- put the american on the hook to pay for thousands and thousands of abortion trips every year with no clear restrictions. of course they have no idea how much it's going to cost the american taxpayer. the department of defense isn't the only department seeking to expand abortion access. last year the department of veterans' affairs announced a
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similar policy. like the department of defense, the v.a. is attempting to circumvent the supreme court decision. the v.a. began performing abortions at taxpayer-funded medical facilities across the country due to the so-called crisis created by commonsense restrictions. this includes states like my home state of alabama where, by the way, abortion is illegal. never mind that the federal law prohibits the use of v.a. facilities for abortions. never mind that. never mind that the supreme court rule that states can pass their own laws regulating the issue. that's what the supreme court says. never mind that the v.a. provided no protections for staff who may have religious objections to performing these procedures and never mind cost to taxpayers, impact on veterans and the will of the american
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people. never mind all of that. the v.a. providing abortions is against the law. absolutely against the law. it's an unconstitutional abuse of the government and it should not be tolerated. last week more than half of the republican conference -- republican congress and dozens of lawmakers joined me disapproving of the v.a. law allowing abortion on demand. our resolution defends the law, the unborn, our veterans who depend on the v.a. for their health care. soon we will force a vote on this resolution because the american people deserve to know where each senator in in this rm stands on the law, in protecting life, and with abortion at any time. the people need to know that and
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where everybody stands. this extreme abortion madness does not appear to be stopping with the military and the v.a. the biden department of health and human services is considering declaring a public health emergency on abortion. it's an emergency. the idea would be laughable if it wasn't so seriously wrong for our country. of course this is just another power grab. the public health emergency frees up extra money and gives the federal government more control. why else would they do it? it's just like the sham of the covid declaration we're still living under somehow. we still have a declaration of emergency. there is no emergency because roe-wade was overturned. democrats think that giving americans the power to self-govern is some kind of crisis and president biden seems
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set on forcing taxpayers to fund an abortion agenda that is completely out of step with the american people. only 19% of americans support late-term abortion, and a majority support a 15-week ban. but you probably haven't heard that because pro-life americans are often silenced. no more. we will not be silent. we believe that every american, including the unborn, has a right to life. we believe in the authority of the supreme court who made the issue they clear last year, let the states decide what each voter wants. we believe our military and v.a. should be focused on national defense and veterans, not politics. and we believe in a government that works within the law.
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using our military in fake emergencies to make sure there are no limits on abortion is absolutely, positively shameful. i will never bow to the mob saying otherwise. it's embarrassing to our country. and i encourage all americans who believe in the value of human life to stand up and join me. madam president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. c.b.o.ms. klobuchar: madam pres, as if in legislative session, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the consideration of s. res. 57, submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senate resolution 57, honoring the life of david ferd
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duramberger, former senator from the state of minnesota. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. klobuchar: i ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. klobuchar: thank you, madam president. i rise with my colleague, senator smith, who will be speaking shortly, to recognize the life of senator dave durenburger, who passed away on january 3 #, 20 -- 31, 2023, leaving behind his wife susan and his four sons, two stepchildren and 14 grandchildren. last week i had the honor of attending dave's funeral at
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st. john's abby in collegeville, minnesota, attendees included governors of both parties. it was a fitting venue because in so many ways dave was st. john's college. he was raised there by his parents, george and isa isabel,h of whom were faculty members, and both at st. john's prep and st. john's university, he was raised with the values of faith, stewardship and justice. shortly after i won my first senate race, dave invited me to breakfast. and there's actually a photo of us on the wall when we had that breakfast in that restaurant. and he had a few lessons that he
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wanted to share with me. he didn't sugarcoat anything. he said that washington can eat you up and that too often the value of stewardship is missing. he told me to join the prayer breakfast because he said it was one place where people could talk to each other, nothing would leak, and you could build trust and take a moment and put things in perspective. i did join the prayer breakfast and two years later, as often happens in these things, i was cochairing it with former senator johnny isakson, another very good senator we miss very much. he gave me a small book called the freedom of teachings of jesi keep on my book shelf. as he predicted, i did look at it in moments of good and
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moments of bad. one of the teachings stood out to me as i was reflecting on dave's life from matthew 5:16. let your light shine before others so they can see your good deeds and glorify your father in heaven. that's dave. through the bluster of washington, dave found ways to bring his good work and his belief in public service to the rest of the country. dave took volunteerism seriously. he saw it how he lived his life. he paired up with his then-democratic colleague senator paul wellstone on the legislation that created amerry corp. -- americorps. millions and millions of americans got the support they need to better their communities. dave's devotion to stewardship is also clear when you look at what he did to promote conservation. it was in that spirit that he
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worked to secure boundary waters for canoe areas, for voyagers national park and the mississippi river. he wanted his kids and grandkids to experience the national treasure that minnesotans have enjoyed for generations. and you can't talk about dave's time in washington without noting what he did for those with disabilities. and from his time in former republican governor's office, he carried a steadfast commitment to improving the lives of disabled people across the country. once, through his work in the governor's office, dave visited a hospital where he saw patients with disabilities,
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and in his words they were warehoused. most of them, he said, didn't even have clothes on. he knew that as a society we can and must do better. and in washington he saw to it that we did. through his leadership, as i know you are aware of, madam chair, given the leadership, the torch passed on to you, through his leadership on the americans with disabilities act, he helped usher in a whole new era of disabilities rights, one where people in wheelchairs weren't trapped in their homes as a result of a lack of ramps, one where disabled people weren't systematically excluded from the workforce and one where the destitute facilities take once motivated him to take action were phased out in favor of community residential treatment and care services. in the years that followed, he found a loving partner in his wife, susan, his dedication to
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mental health reform eventually led her to write her book the crusade for forgotten souls, a rich history of the campaign to provide dignified care to minnesotans with disabilities. and minnesota back through the time of hubert humphrey when he gave his famous speech in the 1948 democratic convention has always been ahead of itself when it came -- and the rest of the country when it came to people with disabilities. dave, a republican, carried on that torch from the other side of the aisle. from the outside, dave's work often looked like the manifestation of faith in action, but the way he saw it, he was just doing his job, the good deeds, lending -- letting his light shine on to others. when dave left the senate, it wasn't easy. it's been quite documented what happened. and he could have been bitter.
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he could have just hidden away and ducked down and not taken responsibility, but he didn't. he apologized and he kept working. he taught. he would bring his students out here on health care. he was an advocate for health care reform. he still spoke around the state, and he showed us that kind of resilience that only can come when something happens to someone where they have to decide am i going to sink down further in a valley or am i going to rise up on the mountaintop and do good again. that included mentoring new senators and new people in public office, which included me. he did good. both while he was in the senate, before he got here, and then of course after he left. he had a higher purpose, and he found a way one way or another
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to improve people's lives. as a senator, as an educator, a husband, as a dad, and as a grandpa. dave lived every day of his life trying to do good, and he will earned that, of course, growing up at st. john's, but he brought it to this chamber and beyond. so today senator smith and i are coming together to introduce this resolution which we're honored has passed, honoring senator dave durenberger, a man whose higher purpose led our country to a higher ground. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor. ms. smith: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. ms. smith: thank you, madam president. thank you to my colleague, senator chob, for those very personal words about our shared friend, senator dave durenberger. i rise today with my colleague, senator klobuchar to honor the
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life of senator dave durenberger whom we lost, as amy said, on january 31. archie and i send all our support to the durenberger family, to susan, charlie, and lois, dave and heather, michael and margaret, daniel and jennifer, and to all of the family that loved him so well. when he was first elected to the senate in 1978, senator durenberger became the first republican senator from minnesota in 20 years, but his political affiliation never defined him. throughout his 16 years in service in the senate, senator durenberger measured his success by doing work that helped people, not by scoring political points for himself or his party. long before arriving in washington, senator durenberger was committed to public service and committed to improving the lives of minnesotans. he was, as amy said, a proud graduate of st. john's university and the university of minnesota law school and he also
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spent two years as an army officer and seven more in the reserves. and later he served as chief of staff for governor harold la lavander. when i became chief of staff for mike dayton, dave quickly called me up to offer his advice and support with his characteristic, understatement, and dry sense of humor. in minnesota senator durenberger was respected as a volunteer, a thinker, a doer. he was always ready to pitch in and help with the wide array of organizations that he saw were doing good work, from those dedicated to environmental protection and conservation to children's health. and the senate, dave built a reputation as a powerful advocate, an expert on health care reform. he was instrumental in passing the landmark americans with disabilities act which recognized the civil rights of people living with disabilities. and he was an effective leader on legislation to protect our
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air and water, clean up of superfund sites and protect public lands so all of our children and grandchildren can enjoy them forever. after he left the senate, he continued to advocate for the things that he cared about, from improving health care to protecting the environment. he became one of the nation's leading health policy experts at the university of st. thomas, and helped to mentor the next generation of health polity leaders. -- policy leaders. when i came to the senate and won a seat on the health, education, labor and pensions committee, a committee that dave also served on, he comeedly reached out to me to offer -- immediately reached out to me to offer support and ideas. every year he organized a group of young health care leaders through the health policy center in st. thomas to come to washington and i always made time to sit down and talk with them. it was so great to see how senator durenberger continued to instill in these policy fellows the mission of diving in beneath
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the headlines to figure out exactly what would make health care more accessible and affordable for everyone. when dave was elected to the senate, he was an independent republican as the minnesota state party was then called. he later dropped the republican part and was a proud independent, always willing to work with both democrats and republicans to solve problems. he was an outspoken critic of president trump and he lamented the extremism in the republican party today. dave always stood for bipartisanship, pragmatism, and politics that is about improving people's lives. he proudly called himself a progressive republican. i love that. if i had to name one thing that characterized senator dave durenberger, it would be his determination to find solutions to the problems that hold people back in their lives, especially problems with health care. he didn't care whether an idea came from republicans or democrats.
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he just cared about what was going to make a difference. as i reflect on his life and his time in the senate, i'm reminded that his midwestern brand of bipartisan, common sense, pragmatic politics but still lives on in the senate today. beneath the headlines and the division and extremism, many of us on both sides of the aisle still carry on his legacy by working together to try to find common ground and solve problems. so today as we mourn the loss of senator durenberger, let us take inspiration from his example of thoughtful, pragmatic, and results oriented politics. may his memory be a blessing. madam president, separately, i ask unanimous consent for annette christy, holy and mary parish, all fellows in my office to have floor privileges for the rest of the current session of congress. the presiding officer: without objection.
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ms. smith: madam president, i yield the floor. a senator: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: madam president, it was a busy weekend for the united states military which has now shot down three unidentified objects over north american air space in many days. on friday an f-22 took down an object hovering over alaska which officials describe as being about the size of a small car. on saturday an f-22 brought down an object over canada that it described only as sill lynn cal -- sill lynn dra cal. and on sunday they shot down another unidentified object traveling at about 20,000 feet low enough to interfere with
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commercial air traffic. given the high profile of the chinese spy balloon, this is obviously of great interest to the american people. over the last several days, starting in late february, the american people watched as china's surveillance balloon traveled across the country before president biden finally instructed the military to shoot it down over the coast -- or off the coast of south carolina. that was just nine days ago. the military is still recovering pieces of that balloon from the bottom of the atlantic in an effort to gain some answers. but given everything that's happened in the interim, the swirl of questions has only grown. the united states has shot down four objects flying over our country since february the 4th. they have identified one of those four objects.
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so based on what we know now or perhaps what we don't know now, we know the government has shot down three objects of unknown providence. since they don't know what they are, presumably they don't know where they came from. yet they -- the president ordered them shot down. we're not told whether they were emitting any sort of signature like heat which might be picked up by an infrared sensor or some other signal with data either coming from or going to that object. so you can imagine that the american people have a lot of questions about these unidentified objects as well as the broader threat to our national interest. they're looking to the administration for answers and the only path forward is full and complete transparency.
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president biden needs to explain what happened and just how concerned the american people should be, and he needs to consult with congress and share the information he has with us. until that happens, speculation will only intensify. it's only human nature to if you don't know what the cause of a particular concern of anxiety or maybe even a threat, it's only human nature to speculate and imagine the very worst. so the last several days have prompted a lot of questions, and i hope the administration will provide some necessary answers soon. i expect the chinese spy balloon and these unidentified objects will be the topics of discussion in the senate this week. i know all of our colleagues, republican and democrat alike, are eager to learn more, and i
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hope the administration will be what it has not yet been and that is forthright and transparent. on another matter, mr. president, the united states -- this last week president biden spoke at his state of the union address about the looming debt crisis, but he turned it instead of a plea for unity and bipartisanship and working together, he turned it into political fearmongering and finger pointing. he even suggested that republicans want to cut funding for social security and medicare on which millions upon millions of seniors depend, something that could not be further from the truth. you might call it the big lie. speaker mckarnlg mccarthy is leading debt ceiling discussions
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for republicans ansae has been absolutely clear that these programs are not on the chopping block. as the american people witnessed last tuesday evening, the republicans all agree on this point. social security and medicare are a lifeline for seniors and some of the most vulnerable people in our country, and these programs are not going anywhere, period. but what the president and our democratic colleagues have failed to acknowledge is that the status quo is not sustainable, particularly when to comes to social security. we're told by the actuaries that unless congress doing is, social security and medicare will become insolvent and incapable of paying the benefits upon which millions of seniors depend. i have to ask whether the president, by this fearmongering, made it easier or harder for us to work together
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to meet our responsibilities and to eliminate the threat of insolvency, which we are on a path to if the president does nothing. did the president make it more likely that republicans and democrats will work together to provide for the solvency and survival of social security or medicare by fearmongering and finger-pointing? well, i think we all know he did not. projections show that social security recipients will see a reduction of almost 25% in their benefits if nothing changes. so we know we have to do something. texans who live on fixed incomes cannot handled a 25% cut. they're already struggling to keep up with inflation, as things are, which is now about 6.5%. that's essentially a paycheck for the american people, thanks to the profligate spending of
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our democratic colleagues and this administration. but a 25% reduction is absolutely unfathomable. given the strong bipartisan support for social security that we saw last week, i hope we will all agree that we can't allow these programs to run out of money. there is a clear bipartisan desire to save social security. last congress senators romney of utah, senator manchin of west virginia introduced the trust act to rescue social security. i was proud to cosponsor that legislation, and i hope it will gain some momentum this year. unfortunately, the white house has already slammed the door on that possibility once again. so we see a trend here where instead of engaging in a bipartisan manner with members of congress to tray to solve problems -- to try to solve problems, the president just
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makes things harder and less likely for those consultation and that cooperation to occur. a white house spokesman even described a commission like the one the bill would create like a, quote, death panel for social security and medicare. yet, four decades ago then- senator biden voted for social security reforms proposed by what he now refers to as a death panel and those reforms extended the program for another 50 years. two years ago the senate voted senator romney's trust act as an amendment to the democrats' reckless budget and it actually passed by a vote of 71-29. that is more than 20 of our democratic colleagues voted for it, a strong bipartisan vote, he 71-29. so it's completely irresponsible
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for the president to claim that republicans want to cut social security and medicare and then demagogue the very bipartisan efforts to protect the longevity of these programs. how shameful and irresponsible is that? whether or not the president will admit it, he knows that social security is operating on borrowed time. we need to ensure its longterm success and the trust act is a great starting point for conversations to do just that. of course, this is just one small part of the major changes we need to see to get our scale house in order. the national debt is now $31.5 trillion. congress can't raise the debt limit and continue to borrow and spend like there's no tomorrow. interest on that $31 trillion debt approaches $1 trillion a
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year. that means more and more of the discretionary spending that we need in order to defend our country or to support other priorities goes up in smoke because we have to pay interest on that $31.5 trillion in borrowed money. yes, we do need to avoid a debt crisis and no one in congress wants us to default on our debts, but we also need to enact broader reforms to change the trajectory of this out-of-control spending. last week i was proud to join with senator hyde-smith of mississippi in introducing an amendment to the constitution that would require a balanced budget. i've authored and vote for similar legislation in the past, and i believe that this is a critical component to smart
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spending reforms. families, businesses, and state and local governments all have no choice but to balance their budget. if there's not money coming in the front door, they can't spend it out of back door -- unless, of course, you're the federal government and you print money. the federal government is the only glaring exception to this commonsense financial practice, and we're seeing the consequences. the national debt has skyrocketed from $3.2 trillion in 1980 to $9.7 trillion in 2000. and then to $31.5 trillion today. it has more than tripled since 2000. it's past time to take action to address this growing debt crisis, and there's real-world evidence that balancing -- balanced budgets work.
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every state including texas has one, and we are far from operating in the red like the federal government. in fact, texas has gone into the current legislative session with a $33 billion surplus. you don't do that by borrowing money and forcing your children and grandchildren to pay the bills. you do you it by responsible budgeting. i've always been a proponent of taking the texas model nationwide, and this is an example of my state's smart fiscal policies that the federal government needs to emulate. one of the earliest lessons we teach our children is about only spending the money that you have and not spending money you don't have. it's time to apply that same commonsense logic to the federal government. so i appreciate senator hyde-smith's leadership on this bill, and i'm proud to be one of the 23 cosponsors and would
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invite all of our colleagues to consider joining us in cosponsoring this legislation. you might wonder, is this just some republican trick or not? well, it's interesting to note that the current occupant of the white house, president biden, voted for a balanced budget amendment when he was a member of the united states senate, and he didn't just do it once; he didn't just do it twice; he did it three times. then-senator biden voted for a balanced budget amendment in march of 1995 when the debt was $4.9 trillion. in june of 1966, he voted for a balanced budget amendment when the debt was $5.1 trillion, and in march of 1997, when the debt stood at $5.4 trillion, joe biden, then senator biden, voted
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for a balanced budget amendment to the constitution. my republican colleagues have offered a range of proposals to reign in the -- to rein in the national debt. all of these ideas should be part of a serious discussion to address this crisis. if you strip away the agreements about how we got here and the best path forward, there's one unavoidable truth -- when it comes to finances, the united states is on an unsustainable course. the national debt will haunt every generation until leaders show enough courage to make tough choices and fix this mess. and i can't think of any better time than now. so i hope president biden will stop the fearmongering and stop the demagoguing and take this crisis seriously. republicans and democrats alike want to avoid a debt crisis, but
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so far we haven't taken the necessary steps to rein in the irresponsible spending and to support and sustain and save important prime ministers like social security a -- important programs like social security and medicare for future generations. niece are popular commonsense goals and i hope that our democratic colleagues will stop playing politics and start talking about solutions. i yield the floor. mr. cassidy: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. cassidy: madam president, the national flood insurance program has officially been in effect for almost a i do not
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remember. families in louisiana are feeling the unfolding disaster. now, we're not talking about a storm or a flood which the national flood insurance program is supposed to protect against. we're talking about the financial crisis unfolding at kitchen tables. families cannot afford the premium hikes that the nfip is planning with risk rating 2.0. for some the premiums have become unaffordable and threatened the collapse -- the value of their home. for now rate hikes are capped at 18% a year. but these compound year after year. so the couple who have introduced in their house for decades, they're not thinking, okay, it's only 18%. now, they're thinking it's 18 pour compounded upon 18%. and they don't have a plan to move, oh, let's escape from it. this is where they have been for
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decades. and 18% compounds and adds a up very quickly. this is not fiction. these are real stories that i hear from folks in louisiana, great americans, great louisianans, love our country, and they're wondering, what in the heck is going on? an example, the bougua family. they have owned forum that for 56 years. it has never been in a flood zone and that is never flooded. they paid $a-00 a year in flood insurance premiums. after risk rating 2.0, they're scheduled to pay when fully in effect, scheduled to pay $500 per month. $500 a year to $500 per month. now, their full risk premium will reach $60 -- almost $6,300 in 14 years. but their annual payment will
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double in the fourth year. so how many 83-year-old retired couples do you know that can afford an extra $5,800 in expenses just like that? the holiday season just passed. i'm sure their family -- we have big families in louisiana -- that their children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, but i'm sure there is extra budgeting this year. families should not have to spend holidays budgeting for this kind of increase in flood insurance premium when they've never flooded. that's the crazy thing about it. they've never flooded, and these are the premium increases that they're seeing. now, families across louisiana and in america's coastal communities, not just in louisiana, are finding themselves in the similar situation to the bouguas. louisiana has been hard hit by hurricanes over the last few years. to exin my state are still
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recovering and, they are responsible in maintaining their insurance. but with risk rating 2.0, it feels like the biden administration is kicking them when they're trying to get back on their feet. so it begs the question, why is the administration allowing risk rating 2.0 to take effect? president $president biden can stop it with the stroke of a pen. he has the power. he should have asked fema to delay or cancel the implementation of risk rating 20 -- 2.0. fema has been not only been slow, they've stonewalled members of congress, not being up front about the cost to policyholders. homeowners did not get significant information from fema until less than a month before risk rating 2.0 began to be implemented.
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now many louisiana policyholders are getting notices in the mail of their new risk premium. folks in my state, they feel blind sided. the bourgeois family was blind sided when they got a notice that their full premium will go from $500 a year to $6,295. we're here to serve the american people. and in case again folks think, no, this is not true, they can look at this property, 4 point drive in louisiana. they can see it never flooded. they can see that this is a single family, a main dwelling. and they can see that it's a modest home. it's not a big mansion. the bourgeoises are not millionaires.
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then they can see the premium that they have to pay. they can see that there's no discounts being applied and that their premium eventually grows to that full risk premium. now it's not just this family with this. i have a dozen more insurance bills from constituents showing massive premium hikes through no fault of their own. they're penalized just for living where their families have lived for generations. with risk rating 2.0 fema put them into an impossible situation. now, by the way, families are now choosing to drop out of the program because they can't afford the premium. the pool of homeowners is becoming smaller. leaving those subject to the mandatory requirement to buy insurance worse off. they face, those who are required to own are now faced with the difficult task of coming up with thousands more to
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pay their insurance or to lose their mortgage. fema knows this is going to happen. they know that up to 20% to 25% of those policies holders will drop their policies because they cannot afford them, and that has the potential to put them -- this into an twiewrl -- actuarial death spiral. more and more have to drop. if the intent is to destroy the program, to not help americans in times of flooding, this policy could not be done more effectively. there has to be another option. congress has taken steps to avoid major flooding in the future. louisiana has already received over $680 million for coastal restoration, flood and waterway projects from the infrastructure investment and jobs act. it's already delivering on its promises. when i was helping to negotiate the bill, i had those louisiana families in mind. what can we do to lower the risk
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of flooding which, by the way, then helps all those, helps everyone else in our country to help make this flood insurance program more affordable and sustainable. the second part of helping these families is ensuring they're not forced to move because of unaffordable flood insurance premiums. flood insurance must always remain affordable and accessible to the homeowner, accountable to the taxpayer and sustainable for the future. only president biden has the power to change that now, which he has a responsibility to do. with that, i yield back.
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the presiding officer: the senato ask the safety and security of the american people is the president and the departments number one priority and i want to assure americans these objects do not present in the rent to anyone on the ground. however present risk to civil
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aviation. >>
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is responsible for this. after two years of hearing their stories, i'm positive that not one person working in the white house has bothered to leave washington, d.c. and witness for themselves what is happening to american families as they try to work their way through this. it sure doesn't sound like my democratic colleagues here in the senate have been paying much attention to what is happening with families back home, because if they had taken the time to put themselves in the shoes of a family who is trying to stretch that paycheck month after month after month, they never would have justified
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wasting the families' money on social justice programs and green energy schemes, and the list goes on and on. and now those families who have already been drained by joe biden's spending are running out of things to cut in their family budgets. small businesses are running out of places that they can cut back in their small business while they're trying to keep the doors open. what we're hearing in tennessee is this,less less -- there is less meat on the dinner table than there was a year ago because it costs almost 9% more to buy chicken and beef than just last year. they probably don't have cereal for the crid in the morning because the price of one box of
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cereal has risen about 16%. here we are in the dead of winter, and tennesseans are paying upwards of 15% more to keep the heat on in their houses 15% more than what they paid last year. and if the kids lose a coat at school, it's going to cost 3% more to get a new one if --. if it snows, socks and boots are going to come at the same premium. these percentages are adding up, and right now these families are praying that they'll be able to move around money so that they can keep the kids warm, keep them in school, keep the house dry. madam president, these are not things that are luxuries. they are necessities. and the impact of inflation is
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measurable, measurable to tennessee families. local officials all across tennessee are feeling a different sort of pain when they confront the effects of inflation. earlier this month, i spoke about the incredible growth that is happening right now in west tennessee. companies like ford motor company are moving in, and they're bringing thousands of jobs with them. and now the pressure is on our county mayors and other local officials to start building out roads and utility services to support these projects. officials in these rural counties have worked hard to keep their budgets balanced and their costs down. they too have basically done everything right. they balanced their budget. they have a rainy day fund. and yet, they're still struggling to prepare for the future because even a healthy
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budget can't cover the cost of inflation. supplies are too expensive, raw materials are too expensive, pipe for the water project up 400%, can't get transformers for utility projects, can't keep all of the emergency vehicles and the school buses and the county road department, those vehicles running because the cost of diesel and what it has done. and what we know is that many things are just too expensive to afford. money for luxuries, no. we have to keep the buses running. everything from electrical equipment to parts for emergency vehicles comes with a big price tag. but there is something that
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joe biden and my democratic colleagues could do about this. they could do it if they wanted to, if they chose to. and it's amazing that they have chosen not to do this. if the democrats continue to spend, inflation will continue to rise, economic growth will stagnate, the debt burden will become so large that future generations will never be able to escape it. you know, madam president, that debt burden right now is about $95,000 per u.s. citizen. $95,000. i have a grandchild due this year. when that baby is born, he is going to have his share, $95,000
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of our nation's debt. per tape, that -- per taxpayer that comes out to about a quarter million dollars. i would say, is that moral? is it immoral to pass this on to our children and grandchildren? this debt burden will be very difficult for future generations to escape, and the people who have already lost so much to this big government will continue to suffer. for two years the biden administration has appeared to ignore that type of suffering. now, i say ignored because it would be impossible for them to be not know how obvious and unhappy the american people are with this impact of inflation and the cost of living on them
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every day. a reuters poll recently released before president biden delivered his state of the union address showed that 65% of americans thinks this country is on the wrong track. a year ago, 58% of americans believed we were on the wrong track. so it's safe to say this not only are they unhappy, they see this downward spiral that joe biden and the democrats have thrown them into. the only way out of this is to get our fiscal house in order, and that does include cutting spending. last week i introduced legislation to cut federal spending by 1%. that is one penny out of every dollar. madam president, every agency should be able to save a penny
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out of their budget, and if they can do that one penny, maybe they could do two pennies, maybe they could do five pennies. we could pass those bills this month to cut 1%, 2% or 5% out of the budget. it is going to take putting politics aside -- putting politics aside, it is going to take making certain that we prioritize fiscal responsibility. the frustration that the american people feel with what is happening in this build on the democrats' watch doesn't compare to the pain the people in this country feel when they explain to their kids why there's less food in their lunch boxes this week, why there are different food items on the table when they come home every
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night. but 13% food inflation, that is tough. that is tough on families. you couple that with the amount of inflation at the gas pump and life becomes incredibly expensive. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the clerk will report the chung nomination. the clerk: , nomination, the judiciary. cindy k. chung, of pennsylvania, to be united states district judge for the third circuit. the presiding officer: the question occurs on the nomination. is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll.
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vote:
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vote:
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vote:
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vote:
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the presiding officer: on this vote, the yeas are 50, the nays are 44, the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table, and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action. the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to close debate on executive calendar number 9, gina r. mendez-miro, of puerto rico, to be united states district judge for the district of puerto rico, signed by 17 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the nomination of gina r. mendez-miro of puerto rico to be united states district judge for the district of puerto rico
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shall be brought to a close. the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. vote:
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vote:
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vote:
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vote:
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the presiding officer: the yeas are 52, the nays are 44, and the motion is agreed to.
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mr. schumer: madam president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: are we in a quorum? the presiding officer: no, we're not. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i have one request for a committee to meet today, it has the approval of the majority leader and minority leaders. the presiding officer: duly noted. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent that the appointment at the desk appear separately -- that the appointment at the desk appear separately in the record, as if made by the chair. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i understand that there's a bill at the desk due for a second reading. the presiding officer: the clerk will read the title of the bill for the second time. the clerk: h.r. 185, an act to terminate the requirement imposed by the director of the
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centers for disease control and prevention for proof of covid-19 vaccination for foreign travelers, and for other purposes. mr. schumer: in order to place the bill on the calendar under the provisions of rule 14, i would object to further proceeding. the presiding officer: objection having been heard, the bill will be placed on the calendar. mr. schumer: finally, madam president, i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned under the provisions of s. res. 57 until 11:00 a.m. on tuesday, february 14, that following the prayer and pledge the morning hour deemed expired, the journal of proceedings approved to date, the time for the two readers approved for use later in the day and morning business be closed. further, that following the conclusion of morning business, the senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of the mendez miro nomination postcloture, that at 11:30 a.m., the senate vote on the confirmation and following the cloture vote on the jenkins nomination, the senate recess until 215 to allow for the
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weekly caucus meetings. if clowfort is in-- if cloture is invoked, the senate vote. further, if any nominations are confirmed tuesday, the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the president immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: if there's no further business to come before the senate, i ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order. the presiding officer: under the previous order, and pursuant to senate resolution 57, the senate stands adjourned until 11:00 a.m. tuesday, february 14, and does so as a further mark of does so as a further mark of she becomes the first asian american to serve on the court. lawmakers also voted to advance the nomination of gina mendez to be a u.s. district court judge for puerto rico.
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if confirmed she'll be the 100th judge approved by senate to a lifetime appointment sings the start of the biden administration. work continue osen more judicial nominations rest of the week and as always watch live coverage of the senate, here on c-span2. ♪ ♪ since 19 want in partner with the cable with the house and senate floors, to congressional hearings, party briefings and committee meetings. c-span gives you a front row seat to how issues are debated and decided with no commentary, no disruptions and completely unfiltered. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. preorder your copy of the congressional director for the 118th congress it is your access
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to the federal government with bio and contacts information for every house and senate member important information on congressional committees, federal agencies an state governors, scan the code at the right to preorder your copy today for early spring delivery. it is $295 plus shipping and handli and every purchase will support nonprofit operations at c-span shop.org. ♪ ♪ c-span has your unfiltered view of government for funded by these television companies and more including cox. >> homework can be hard. but squatting in a diner for internet work is harder and we're providing lower income students access to affordable internet so homework can be just homework. cox connect to compete. cox, c-span as a public servant along with other television providers giving you a front row seat

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