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39Senate Resolution 127: Honoring the 108th Anniversary of Selfridge Air National Guard Base and the Contributions of Selfridge Air National Guard Base to the Armed Forces and National Security Of...
40Senate Resolution 128: Recognizing March 14, 2025, as "Black Midwives Day" and the Longstanding and Invaluable Contributions of Black Midwives to Maternal and Infant Health in the United States
Eighteen bills and five resolutions were introduced, as follows: S. 1070-1087, and S. Res. 127-131.
Pages S1776-77
Measures Reported
Special Report entitled ``Further Revised Allocation to Subcommittees of Budget Totals for Fiscal Year 2025''. (S. Rept. No. 119-3) S. 195, to amend the Visit America Act to promote music tourism. (S. Rept. No. 119-4)
Page S1776
Measures Passed
Halt All Lethal Trafficking of Fentanyl Act: By 84 yeas to 16 nays (Vote No. 127), Senate passed S. 331, to amend the Controlled Substances Act with respect to the scheduling of fentanyl-related substances, after agreeing to the committee reported substitute amendment, and taking action on the following amendment proposed thereto:
Pages S1762-68
Withdrawn
Thune (for Grassley) Amendment No. 1237, of a perfecting nature.
Page S1765
Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act
By 54 yeas to 46 nays (Vote No. 133), Senate passed H.R. 1968, making further continuing appropriations and other extensions for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2025, after agreeing to the motion to proceed, and taking action on the following amendments proposed thereto:
Pages S1768-72
Rejected
By 47 yeas to 53 nays (Vote No. 129), Merkley Amendment No. 1273, to except the application of certain rescissions. (A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that the amendment, having failed to achieve 60 affirmative votes, was not agreed to.)
Page S1769
By 47 yeas to 53 nays (Vote No. 130), Duckworth Amendment No. 1274, to make veteran Federal employees who were involuntarily dismissed without cause eligible for reinstatement and to require reports from Executive agencies on the number of veteran employees fired from such agencies. (A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that the amendment, having failed to achieve 60 affirmative votes, was not agreed to.)
Pages S1770-71
By 48 yeas to 52 nays (Vote No. 131), Van Hollen Amendment No. 1272, to prohibit the use of appropriated amounts by DOGE. (A unanimous- consent agreement was reached providing that the amendment, having failed to achieve 60 affirmative votes, was not agreed to.)
Page S1771
By 27 yeas to 73 nays (Vote No. 132), Paul Amendment No. 1266, to reduce the amount appropriated for the United States Agency for International Development.
Page S1771
During consideration of this measure today, Senate also took the following action
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to consideration of the bill, be withdrawn.
Page S1768
By 62 yeas to 38 nays (Vote No. 128), three-fifths of those Senators duly chosen and sworn, having voted in the affirmative, Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the bill.
Pages S1768-69
District of Columbia Local Funds Act
Senate passed S. 1077, to approve local funds for the District of Columbia for fiscal year 2025, in accordance with the Fiscal Year 2025 Local Budget Act of 2024, and to establish provisions for the use of such funds.
Pages S1772-73
National Board Certification Teachers
Senate agreed to S. Res. 129, recognizing and honoring teachers who have earned or maintained National Board Certification. Honoring Dr.
Page S1785
Mary Edwards Walker
Senate agreed to S. Res. 130, honoring the life and legacy of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker.
Page S1785
National CACFP Week
Senate agreed to S. Res. 131, designating the third week of March 2025 as ``National CACFP Week''.
Page S1785
Use of Emancipation Hall
Senate agreed to H. Con. Res. 17, authorizing the use of Emancipation Hall in the Capitol Visitor Center for a ceremony as part of the commemoration of the days of remembrance of victims of the Holocaust.
Page S1785
Authorizing Leadership to Make Appointments: Agreement
A unanimous- consent agreement was reached providing that, notwithstanding the upcoming adjournment of the Senate, the President of the Senate, the President Pro Tempore, and the Majority and Minority Leaders be authorized to make appointments to commissions, committees, boards, conferences, or interparliamentary conferences authorized by law, by concurrent action of the two Houses, or by order of the Senate.
Page S1786
Authority for Committees: Agreement
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that Committees be authorized to report out legislation on Tuesday, March 18, 2025, from 12 noon until 12:30 p.m.
Page S1786
Pro Forma Sessions: Agreement
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that the Senate convene for pro forma sessions only, with no business being conducted on the following dates and times: Tuesday, March 18, 2025, at 12:15 p.m.; Thursday, March 20, 2025, at 12 noon; and that when the Senate adjourns on Thursday, March 20, 2025, it next convene at 3 p.m., on Monday, March 24, 2025.
Page S1786
Phelan Nomination
Senate resumed consideration of the nomination of John Phelan, of Florida, to be Secretary of the Navy.
Page S1773
During consideration of this nomination today, Senate also took the following action
By 64 yeas to 33 nays (Vote No. EX. 134), Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the nomination.
Page S1773
Landau Nomination
Senate continued consideration of the nomination of Christopher Landau, of Maryland, to be Deputy Secretary of State.
Page S1773
During consideration of this nomination today, Senate also took the following action
By 63 yeas to 32 nays (Vote No. EX. 135), Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the nomination.
Page S1773
Phelan and Landau Nominations: Agreement
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that all post-cloture time on the nominations of John Phelan, of Florida, to be Secretary of the Navy, and Christopher Landau, of Maryland, to be Deputy Secretary of State, be expired and Senate vote on confirmation of the nominations at a time to be determined by the Majority Leader, in consultation with the Democratic Leader, no earlier than Monday, March 24, 2025.
Page S1786
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that at approximately 3 p.m., on Monday, March 24, 2025, Senate resume consideration of the nomination of John Phelan, of Florida, to be Secretary of the Navy, and that at 5:30 p.m., Senate vote on confirmation of the nomination of John Phelan, followed by a vote on confirmation of the nomination of Christopher Landau, of Maryland, to be Deputy Secretary of State; and that the motions to invoke cloture filed during the session of the Senate of Friday, March 14, 2025, ripen on Tuesday, March 25, 2025.
Page S1786
Kratsios Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Michael Kratsios, of South Carolina, to be Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Pages S1773-74
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, and pursuant to the unanimous-consent agreement of Friday, March 14, 2025, a vote on cloture will occur on Tuesday, March 25, 2025.
Page S1786
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session. Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S1773
Bhattacharya Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Jayanta Bhattacharya, of California, to be Director of the National Institutes of Health.
Page S1774
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of Michael Kratsios, of South Carolina, to be Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Page S1774
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session.
Page S1774
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S1774
Makary Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Martin Makary, of Virginia, to be Commissioner of Food and Drugs, Department of Health and Human Services.
Page S1774
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of Jayanta Bhattacharya, of California, to be Director of the National Institutes of Health.
Page S1774
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session.
Page S1774
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S1774
Bishop Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of James Bishop, of North Carolina, to be Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget.
Page S1774
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of Martin Makary, of Virginia, to be Commissioner of Food and Drugs, Department of Health and Human Services.
Page S1774
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session.
Page S1774
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S1774
Reitz Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Aaron Reitz, of Texas, to be an Assistant Attorney General.
Page S1774
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of James Bishop, of North Carolina, to be Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget.
Page S1774
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session.
Page S1774
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S1774
Nomination Confirmed
Senate confirmed the following nomination: By 59 yeas to 40 nays (Vote No. EX. 126), Stephen Feinberg, of New York, to be Deputy Secretary of Defense.
Pages S1753-55
S1786 During consideration of this nomination today, Senate also took the following action
By 56 yeas to 39 nays (Vote No. EX. 125), Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the nomination.
Pages S1754-55
Nominations Received
Senate received the following nominations: Routine lists in the Marine Corps.
Page S1786
Nomination Withdrawn
Senate received notification of withdrawal of the following nomination: Adam Boehler, of Tennessee, to be Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs, with the rank and status of Ambassador, which was sent to the Senate on January 28, 2025
Page S1786
Privileged Nominations Referred to Committee:
Page S1776
Statements on Introduced Bills/Resolutions:
Pages S1778-83
Record Votes
Eleven record votes were taken today. (Total--135)
Pages S1754-55, S1762, S1765, S1768-73
Adjournment
Senate convened at 10 a.m. and adjourned at 7:14 p.m., until 12:15 p.m. on Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (For Senate's program, see the remarks of the Acting Majority Leader in today's Record on page S1786.)
Every speech and line is the Congressional Record's own text, read from GovInfo. Speakers are matched to members by GPO's own metadata. Referandom places each turn on the Clerk's video by matching its words: 89 of 240 spoken turns were found. Turns without a time are still listed; they just can't seek.
Mr. President, last Tuesday, I released a committee report. The committee report was about my investigation about the Obama-Biden administration's obstruction of FBI law enforcement efforts against Iran. My report was based in large part on whistleblower disclosure and FBI records. The FBI records show that the Obama-Biden administration blocked arrests of indicted Iranian terrorists in 2015 and 2016.
Now, I know, to my constituents and my fellow Senators, that is history, but it is history that we don't want to repeat. The records show that interference was done against our own people to score political points for what ended up being the failed Iran nuclear deal. Specifically, then-Secretary of State Kerry actually stopped the FBI from doing its job, and the purpose of that interference was to appease Iran.
One FBI agent emailed:
The Obama-Biden administration made our country less safe. We don't want history to repeat itself.
So, as you might expect, none of this changed until President Trump took office in his first term. Records show international banks stopped financing projects in Iran because of the incoming Trump Presidency. Whistleblower disclosures show the Trump administration brought criminals to justice when the Obama-Biden administration did not bring those same criminals to justice.
So now we are in a new Trump administration. I encourage President Trump and his new Director of the FBI, Patel, to take heed of the positive impact in the first Trump term and let the FBI line agents do their jobs without political rot getting in the way.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, I have spoken a lot about it being a new day in America. It is also a new day in the U.S. Senate. When I became leader, I promised we would do things differently around here. I think the last 10 weeks show I was serious about that.
Unfortunately, today, our business is cleaning up from the old way of doing things. We are voting on yet another continuing resolution today because last year's Democrat majority pushed off full-year appropriations again and again.
Last summer, the Appropriations Committee reported out 11 of its 12 bills with bipartisan support. Six of those bills passed out of the committee unanimously. But month after month, Leader Schumer found something more important to do than fund the government, and not 1--not 1--of those 11 bipartisan bills ever came to the floor.
So, today, we are trying to finish up last year's work so that we can begin to do this year's work. To be clear, Republicans aren't thrilled about another CR, but it is our best option to make sure that last year's failure by Democrats doesn't interfere with this year's appropriations process.
I am hopeful that enough Democrats will reject their party's threat of shutting down the government and get this bill passed today. As I said yesterday, it is time to move on, and moving forward, appropriation bills are going to be a priority in the Senate.
When the Appropriations Committee sends a bill to the floor, my goal is to bring it to the floor for consideration, and I hope that my Democrat colleagues will cooperate in that effort. We are going to have a debate, consider amendments, and vote; and we are going to try to avoid the end-of-year pileup in continuing resolutions that I know we are all tired of.
Another continuing resolution--another CR--was nobody's first choice, but I can tell you this: The next time the Senate votes on an appropriations bill, it won't be on the eve of another shutdown.
So I appreciate my colleagues' support for this continuing resolution, and I look forward to a much better process for fiscal year 2026.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, well, as everyone knows, government funding expires at midnight tonight. As I announced yesterday, I will vote to keep the government open.
I believe it is the best way to minimize the harm that the Trump administration will do to the American people. Clearly, this is a Hobson's choice. The CR is a bad bill. But as bad as the CR is, I believe allowing Donald Trump to take even much more power via a government shutdown is a far worse option. A shutdown would allow DOGE to shift into overdrive.
Let me repeat: A shutdown will allow DOGE to shift into overdrive. It would give Donald Trump and DOGE the keys to the city, State, and country. Donald Trump and Elon Musk would be free to destroy vital government services at a much faster rate than they can right now and over a much broader field of destruction that they would render.
In a shutdown, Donald Trump and DOGE will have the power to determine what is considered essential and what is not, and their views on what is not essential would be mean and vicious and would decimate vital services and cause unimaginable harm to the American people.
Making matters even worse, in a shutdown, there is no check on their determinations, Trump and DOGE's determinations on what is essential and what is not. In fact, on February 26, OMB, led by Russell Vought, told Agencies to work with DOGE to create a list of nonessential workers so that they could reduce staffing even faster in a shutdown.
They are already preparing for a shutdown. Musk has told everybody he wants a shutdown because he knows it will help him achieve his horrible goal of just decimating the Federal Government from one end to the other. In other words, if government were to shut down, DOGE has a plan in place to exploit the crisis for maximum destruction.
In a shutdown, American families would be hurt in ways they almost have never been. It could disrupt regional Veterans Affairs offices, curtail mental health services, and accelerate plans to slash staff at Social Security offices. The list goes on and on and on of the damage-- the severe damage--they could do, virtually unchecked.
They can stay in a shutdown as long as they want. There is no off- ramp unless they decide to take that off-ramp, and they won't because this is their best tool for achieving their goal: slash government, slash spending, and use that money for tax breaks for billionaires.
So a shutdown would be the best distraction Donald Trump could ask for--distraction from his awful agenda. Donald Trump owns the chaos in government. He owns the chaos in the stock market. He owns the damage happening to the economy. But he knows that if government shuts down and all the fighting is over which Agencies should be kept and which shouldn't and Republican Senators and Congressmen in just obeisance to Trump keep putting bills on the floor to decide that, it will totally distract from the most important fight of all: fighting Republicans for eviscerating Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid while giving trillions in tax cuts to the ultrarich. That is the fight American people must know about. A shutdown will be a costly distraction from this all-important fight.
Finally, I want to close by reminding everyone it was Republicans who pushed this false shutdown choice. Their inability to govern has led us to this precipice. Our caucus Members have been torn between two awful alternatives, and my colleagues and I have wrestled with which alternative would be worse for the American people. Different Senators come down on different sides of this question, but that does not mean that any Senate Democrat supports a shutdown.
Whatever the outcome, our caucus will be united in our determination to continue the long-term fight to stop Donald Trump's dangerous war on our democracy and on America's working families.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the nomination of Stephen Feinberg, of New York, to be Deputy Secretary of Defense, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from West Virginia (Mr. Justice), the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Hawley) and, the Senator from Wyoming (Ms. Lummis).
Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Wyoming (Ms. Lummis) would have voted ``yea.''
Mr. President, today is a good day for the Senate and a good day for the American people. The Senate will soon pass a bill that is entitled ``HALT Fentanyl Act.'' The House is expected to take the measure up very soon and send it to President Trump, who is waiting with pen in hand to enact one of his campaign promises.
The HALT Fentanyl Act permanently schedules these deadly substances that have been the main driver of overdose deaths in the United States. No longer does the Drug Enforcement Agency need to play this game of Whac-A-Mole every time a cartel develops a new fentanyl knockoff. In other words, today, a fentanyl knockoff might be illegal, and then they change the chemical makeup of it, and it becomes legal. It is a nightmare for law enforcement.
So no longer will Congress be kicking the can down the road with temporary extensions. We have had many, many extensions over the last several years to keep fentanyl scheduled and its analogs scheduled in I. It also revises policies to research schedule I substances. These are changes the research community has welcomed.
Drug overdoses in the United States have exploded to the highest levels we have ever seen, and, of course, this is thanks to fentanyl and fentanyl knockoffs. The Drug Enforcement Agency has called fentanyl and its knockoffs the ``deadliest drug threat the United States has ever faced.''
Since 2016, I have been raising the alarm on deadly synthetic drugs like fentanyl. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I held a hearing on these substances and the need to stay ahead of the peddlers of this poison. Sadly, it has taken us 9 long years to get to permanently scheduling these deadly knockoffs.
Of course, we thank each of the previous Congresses that, on a temporary basis, extended the scheduling of fentanyl and fentanyl knockoffs, but this bipartisan HALT Fentanyl Act takes care of this by making it permanent.
Senators Cassidy, Heinrich, and Johnson were very instrumental in this effort. Their interest in permanently scheduling fentanyl knockoffs inspired the Senate to move this bill to the floor. Republican leadership was also crucial in prioritizing this bill for the floor and helping us navigate the floor process.
Credit is also due to our House colleagues--Representative Griffith, Chairman Guthrie, and now retired Chairwoman McMorris Rodgers--who led and championed the HALT Fentanyl Act on the House side.
I would also like to thank Dr. Tim Westlake, who came up with the temporary scheduling structure that we have been using since the year 2018. He has testified before my committee and before the Congress on numerous occasions, and I thank him for his hard work and unflappable dedication.
So, in the end, this campaign earned the support of nearly every major law enforcement organization and also several medical associations and research associations supporting the research component of this bill.
Most importantly, we must say thanks to the countless families organized over a long period of time across the country that have lost loved ones to fentanyl poisoning and have not given up on this type of legislation to make permanent the scheduling.
I want to thank my Senate staff who helped make this possible, especially Colleen Bloss and Michael Perkins, who spearheaded this effort for me and all the committee members. Together, we have taken steps to open the doors of research to permanently schedule the deadliest substance the United States has ever faced and to send a clear message that Congress is willing and ready to act. Together, we have taken an important step to live up to our commitment to our constituents and to the loved ones lost to put them first and to serve them.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
Mr. President, I come to the floor with my colleague from Wyoming, Senator Cynthia Lummis, to mourn one of Wyoming's most beloved and fiercest champions. He passed earlier this morning. That would be former U.S. Senator Al Simpson--not just former Senator; former member of the Wyoming House of Representatives and former Army veteran. He passed away earlier today at the age of 93 in his hometown of Cody, Wyoming. I talked to his wife Ann this morning. She said it was a beautiful, full Moon, and Al went to Heaven on a moonbeam.
He is known in Wyoming and in this body and across the country for his incredible life of service and really an unparalleled sense of humor.
Throughout his life, Al boldly fought to uphold the values and the ideals of this great Nation. Whether he was serving in the Army or the Wyoming House of Representatives or the U.S. Senate, his commitment and his contributions were evident everywhere.
He was well known for rolling up his sleeves and working with anyone regardless of party to do what he thought was best for Wyoming and the Nation. When the Nation called on Al Simpson, when they called on him to serve, he was always there fighting for our best interests.
Al once said:
So let me tell you about the real Al Simpson. His life and his legacy are defined by the c's--the c's standing for his hometown of Cody, and collegiality is a big part, but also there was courage, character, and credibility.
He represented Wyoming in this Chamber as a U.S. Senator from 1979 to 1997, and for that reason alone, Al looms very large in Wyoming's political history. There is a lot more. He left an indelible mark here in the Senate. While others ran from tough issues, Al welcomed them. It was an opportunity to serve. He actually never backed down from a fight. He embraced the fights as long as he was fighting for what he thought was right.
He sponsored legislation that helped protect our clean water and our clean air. He secured better grazing rights for Wyoming farmers and ranchers. He fought to secure our borders and imposed stiff sanctions on employers who hired illegal immigrants.
He once said:
He was so right.
He was elected by our Republican conference in the Senate in 1985 to serve as the assistant Republican leader. He was the first Republican whip from the State of Wyoming. He was the whip for 10 years, and he did it under the leadership of Senator Bob Dole. So I am proud to hold the office today that he once held. His leadership brought Wyoming values to Washington, and he left a lasting national impact.
Al came from a family of public servants. His father Milward was both Wyoming Governor and Senator. His dad Milward was Al's role model for public service and civic leadership. His big brother Pete once explained:
Everyone who knew Al well knows that his most important influence in his life came from the love of his life,
They were an inspiration to all of us--to me, to my wife Bobbi, and they were, I know, to Cynthia and her husband Al. They made a legendary team, always working together to make both Wyoming and Washington a better place.
Al liked to say:
Yet, for Al, politics was never personal. His debates were passionate and they were principled. He was friends with Ted Kennedy. They collaborated together on legislation. From energy, to border security, to fiscal responsibility, Al worked across the aisle to tackle the tough issues. He always did what he believed was best for the country. In today's political environment, Al's example of bridging partisan divides is more important than ever.
In the art of persuasion, Al Simpson could teach a master class. One reason Al was so persuasive was his humor. He had an incredible sense of humor. He had close personal relationships with Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush. The title of his biography tells a lot about Al. It is called ``Shooting from the Lip.'' Al was a gunslinger when it came to clever quips. There are too many to count. We don't want to recount some of them on the floor of the Senate; they would probably be stricken from the record. But that is who Al Simpson was. He made you laugh. He also made you think. And that is what made Al so special. He took his service seriously, but he never took himself too seriously.
Al and Ann returned to Wyoming after he retired from the Senate. Fortunately for Wyoming and our Nation, that service did not end because they never really retired. Al enthusiastically served numerous groups and organizations, which all have benefited from his presence. From his beloved alma mater, the University of Wyoming, to the world- renowned Buffalo Bill historical center, Al Simpson devoted his time, his talent, and his treasure.
When Al saw an unmet need in his community, he worked to see that it was addressed. He was especially active in mentoring future leaders. It is no wonder that he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2022. It is the highest honor an American civilian can get for service to our country.
He was a model of leadership for everyone, regardless of party. He did it all across Wyoming and through the years here in Congress. Once, he said:
Integrity, work ethic, incredible whit--Al truly leaves behind a legendary career. For Wyoming, Al is a native son and also a North Star and a rock star.
For the U.S. Senate, Al is a leader, a legislative craftsman, and a principled lawmaker.
For me, he was a mentor and friend.
To Ann; to their children, Bill, Collin, and Sue--I talked to Bill and Collin this morning; to their entire extended family, I join the Nation and Wyoming in sending you our heartfelt condolences.
We can take solace in knowing that the decades of work Al did to make Wyoming and our country a better place will be felt for generations to come.
Thank you, Senator Barrasso, for those lovely remarks. We both loved Al Simpson, and we will always love Al Simpson.
Today, we join the entire State of Wyoming, his family, and his close friends in celebrating his life and mourning the passing of U.S. Senator Al Simpson.
He was absolutely larger than life and always will be a beloved statesman. He dedicated his entire life to serving others, his entire life of 93 years--for 18 years here in the U.S. Senate, 12 years in the Wyoming House of Representatives, and 28 years as a very active elder statesman, particularly in his efforts to help and serve our beloved alma mater, the University of Wyoming.
He tirelessly advocated for the State of Wyoming, fighting to ensure that every corner of our State was not only a great place to work but a great place to make a home and raise a family. Indeed, he contributed to that as well with his children and grandchildren and his beloved, beautiful Ann Simpson.
My gosh, I saw a picture in the hallway in their home of Ann Simpson when she was in college. She was an absolute knockout. They became the inseparable, dynamic duo of Wyoming--she playing the straight woman to his hilarious antics that everyone so loved.
There was no stronger advocate for the needs, industries, and interests of Wyoming than Senator Al Simpson.
As Senator Barrasso mentioned, during his U.S. Senate tenure, he was repeatedly chosen by his colleagues to serve in leadership as the Republican whip and was a close friend and ally of both Presidents Reagan and George H. W. Bush.
Those who met Senator Al Simpson knew he never forgot a face or an interaction, good or bad, and he was happy to remind you of either. Those who were privileged enough to call him friend enjoyed his fierce loyalty, truly fierce loyalty--the kind we all hope we might have with someone in our lives.
His famous sense of humor--I once went to a reception here in Washington, DC, at a beautiful home, and we walked in, and there was a fireplace in the hallway with an original Pissarro hanging over the fireplace, and he goes: Oh, look, Cynthia, it is a ``piss-a-roo.'' That was classic Al Simpson. Al was well known around the Capitol for his pithy one-liners.
Families in Cody looked forward to spotting him towering--he was a very tall man, maybe 6 feet 7 inches or so, and he would tower above the trick-or-treaters--in his costume, by the way, of Frankenstein. He called himself Frankenal. He would imitate the monster, which he also had perfected over the years.
Al loved life. He loved public service. He loved the State of Wyoming and, particularly, the University of Wyoming.
My gosh, he was so good to the law school, to the trial advocacy clinics. There was just nothing he wouldn't do to help the University of Wyoming excel as an institution.
But he never missed an opportunity to praise his beloved Ann, his children, his grandchildren. I was in law school with both Colin and Bill Simpson. The legacy of that family for the practice of law in Wyoming and elsewhere in the country is truly significant, in addition to the many other legislative victories and policy wins and the fabulous museum, the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, in Wyoming, which is truly a world-class--world-class--institution, in large part because of Ann and Al's complete dedication to it.
Last year, Ann and Al celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary. How did they celebrate it? They held an ice cream social at Cody City Park with family, friends, and neighbors. That was the Simpson way of doing things. At every gathering Al Simpson attended, people flocked to him-- and I mean flocked--for a moment with a man each considered one of their closest friends. That is the effect that he had on people. That is the incredible aura that was part of Al Simpson. He truly was a proud son of Cody, WY.
Coming from an early pioneer family, Al never forgot his ancestors and the people who came before him. Senator Barrasso just mentioned that his father Milward was also a noted Wyoming character; and that trait continues on in the entire family.
He never forgot his goals, which were to spread integrity, humor, service, and to make sure that the Wyoming he left, the country he left, would be better for the next generation. And I can tell you, he accomplished that. He is one of those people you can look to and say: He did that in his life.
Al's family were his pride and joy, and he was our pride and joy as a beloved son of Wyoming, a great mentor, a fabulous human being, someone in your life that if you met Al Simpson, it was something you would say: What was one of my great joys in life? And one would certainly be: I knew Al Simpson.
So I ask you all to join us in celebrating the tremendous, extraordinary, curious life of U.S. Senator Al Simpson.
Mr. President, I wanted to join my colleagues from Wyoming. I heard they were paying a tribute to Al Simpson who recently passed away. It was my good fortune 15 years ago to be a member of the Simpson-Bowles Commission where Al Simpson, who had been retired from the Senate, cohosted that with Erskine Bowles in a bipartisan effort to deal with the deficit.
I never had a better time and a more educational experience than to be on that Commission. And, of course, you can't talk about Al Simpson's public service without referring to his sense of humor.
I said to a friend the other day on the floor of the Senate, I miss that part of the Senate. There used to be, you could count on several Senators to always have a joke, and he was one of them.
And good joke-tellers, I have found, have two qualities. First, they tell the same joke many times, but it seems like it is the first time. And, second, they usually start laughing before the punchline because they are enjoying the joke so much themselves.
But in addition to his good humor and nice way about him, he was a wonderful person to work with--really bipartisan. Being a Democrat, I didn't know quite how I would deal with him since we had never served together in the Senate, but he took me under his shoulder like any Member of his own party or family.
I might also mention for the record that Al and his wife were close friends with Paul and Jeanne Simon from Illinois, my predecessor; and Ann Simpson attended the funeral service for Jeanne Simon in Carbondale, IL, and I thought that was a nice tribute family to family.
I am sorry we don't have people like Al Simpson still serving. Maybe it is an incentive for all of us to learn a joke or two.
Mr. President, we are in the tenth week of the first 10 weeks, obviously, of this Senate's session. It has been exceptionally productive during this time period.
We have not only moved more nominees into confirmation for President Trump than any Senate has done in more than two decades, we have passed bills like the Laken Riley Act, which will absolutely help us in trying to remove criminal aliens out of the country.
We have rolled back a lot of Biden's last-minute regulations that he literally threw in in the final hours that did not have the oversight, did not have the appearance. And they, obviously, didn't do it in the first 3\1/2\ years of their term. They stalled it till the very end on that for a reason: because it was unpopular with the American people.
Those have been rolled back, many of them, and we still have several to go.
Today we are finishing up a bill called HALT Fentanyl. The fentanyl epidemic is raging in our country.
If you go back to just 2019 and compare that to 2023, in that short period of time, in my State of Oklahoma in 2019, we had 50 people who died of fentanyl. Fast-forward 4 years to 2023, the last year that we have complete records on; that is actually 730 people died. In 2023, across the country, we had 74,000 Americans who died from fentanyl overdose.
Again, go back to 2019. Only about 10 percent of the opioid deaths in my State had fentanyl connected to it. Fast forward to 2023, 90 percent of the opioid-related deaths were connected to fentanyl.
What the Mexican cartels are doing and what Chinese precursor chemicals coming into the country are causing is the death of fellow citizens, as they slip it into different fake pills, as they slip it into methamphetamine, as they slip fentanyl into cocaine, as they slip it into different places, to have someone who is using a drug or someone who never intended to use that drug to take their life. It has to stop.
Even worse, the cartels not only know what they are doing, but they are trying to find specific ways to be able to avoid our laws. Fentanyl has a very specific definition in science of exactly what makes up fentanyl. And so what the cartels are doing is they are changing that chemical makeup ever so slightly in what they call an analog, and so it is really not ``fentanyl'' as a definition--meaning law enforcement, when they see it on the street, it has the same effect: It still kills you, but it is, actually, technically, not fentanyl, so you can't be prosecuted for it.
This bill that we are bringing to the floor today opens up the fentanyl definitions to deal with fentanyl and the analogs of fentanyl so that the cartels can't continue to bring these deadly drugs into our country to take the lives and increase addiction in America and get away with it. This puts it in the hands of law enforcement, where they have been disarmed in that area, enforcement priorities, so they can actually enforce the law on these cartels and on the drug dealers and so we can identify it for what it really is. It is a killer drug.
The HALT Fentanyl Act is incredibly important. And I am fully aware that in a week where our country is talking about: Are we going to have another government shutdown, it is going to slip through and people aren't even going to notice it. But law enforcement will notice it, and families in the future will notice it.
The folks aren't dealing with the same addiction, as we are putting one more piece out there to be able to take this off.
Mr. President, before I begin my comments, I wanted to acknowledge the extraordinary life and the contributions of Senator Alan Simpson from Wyoming. I had an opportunity to hear several of my colleagues speak to the accomplishments of Senator Alan Simpson. And while I did not have an opportunity to serve with him, my father served many years with Al Simpson, and he and my mother Nancy were very close friends with Al and his wife Ann. They traveled together. They joked together.
And I had an opportunity to occasionally meet with Al Simpson. As has been mentioned, his humor was legendary. And as a young woman who was kind of observing, here you have this very important person, this Senator from Wyoming, who was very accomplished in so many years, with a sense of humor and a joke for just about everything--sometimes appropriate, maybe sometimes not quite as appropriate. But he was a genuinely beautiful individual, and you saw how he reacted and interacted with people at all levels.
I can only imagine the depth of appreciation and love that he had from the people in the great State of Wyoming because those of us who had just mere glimpses of an opportunity to see him and to know him found him to just be truly a lovely and a good man.
So I know that my parents would want me to be able to express my condolences to the Simpson family and the great appreciation for the contributions that he made to his State of Wyoming and to our great country.
I want to thank the Senator from Alaska, who is an extraordinarily talented leader on the Appropriations Committee, for her comments.
Mr. President, I rise to urge passage of this funding measure to prevent an unnecessary, harmful, and costly government shutdown at midnight tonight.
Government shutdowns are inherently a failure to govern effectively and have negative consequences all across government. They inevitably require certain government employees, such as Border Patrol agents, members of our military and Coast Guard, TSA screeners, and air traffic controllers, to report to work with no certainty at all on when they will receive their next paycheck. That is just unfair.
Shutdowns also put critical investments in our national defense on hold. Training exercises would be limited, which could hurt our Nation's readiness. New programs would be paused, delaying new capabilities from getting to our warfighters. That is why we have always, in the past, avoided CRs for the Department of Defense. At our borders, the men and women performing vital law enforcement activities would have to do so without pay and without the assistance of support staff, putting more pressure on frontline operators.
Other harmful potential impacts include curtailed operations to the Veterans Benefits Administration, resulting in the closure of education and GI bill call centers and the suspension of career counseling and transition assistance for our veterans; the closure of our wonderful national parks to visitors; increased travel delays as the onboarding of additional TSA agents would stall, and some FAA employees would face furloughs; and costly delays for projects at the Army Corps of Engineers and critical water infrastructure projects.
That is just a very partial list of the harm that would be done from a government shutdown. This unfortunate situation that we are in with a continuing resolution should, however, have been avoided. The Senate should have finished these bills last year. I called for that repeatedly, as did many other Members.
Senator Murray and I worked as a team, provided leadership, consulted with the members of our Senate Appropriations Committee. Each of us worked so hard to report 11 of the 12 bills with overwhelming bipartisan support, including 6 which came out of our committee unanimously. Unfortunately, these bipartisan bills languished on the calendar for months, never being brought to the floor for consideration.
This decision by the then-Senate majority leader denied Senators the opportunity to debate and amend our reported bills and denied the House and the Senate the chance to go to conference and work out the differences among the bills. Similarly, attempts since January by House Chairman Tom Cole and I to reach agreement with our Democratic counterparts regrettably were not successful, despite my making five good-faith offers. Now that opportunity is gone. A yearlong CR is, by no means, my first choice, but our focus now, given where we are, must be on preventing a government shutdown.
For the most part, this is a straightforward CR that simply continues fiscal year 2024 funding levels. Now, it does include--and this is important--a number of needed anomalies that are aimed at addressing pressing needs.
For example, the CR realigns funding in the appropriations accounts for the Department of Defense to meet current global threats and covers the cost of pay raises for junior enlisted personnel.
It provides increased funding for housing assistance and for what is known as the WIC Program--for Women, Infants, and Children--to maintain support for these vulnerable families.
Within the Department of Homeland Security, the continuing resolution includes targeted increases to support ICE operations, to avoid furloughs of TSA airport screeners, and to fund much needed pay raises for members of our Coast Guard.
It also includes increased funding for the FAA so that more air traffic controllers can be hired to make our Nation's airspace safer.
We can delay no longer. It is essential that the continuing resolution be adopted today in order to prevent a harmful government shutdown. I urge its adoption. Let each and every one of us here commit to working together on the fiscal year 2026 budget so that we can enact appropriations bills prior to the start of the new fiscal year.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Madam President, I have made no secret of my opposition to this bill. For weeks, I have been warning about the real dangers of a yearlong CR like the one that has come before us from the House Republicans. But before I talk about those dangers and why I will be voting no on cloture and on final passage, I want my colleagues to hear what I have to say, but I do hope that they will join me in voting no.
I want to talk for a moment about how we did get here because I fear some Members of the Republican leadership may need a history lesson. The fact of the matter is, the only reason we are staring down a shutdown deadline halfway into this fiscal year is that the House Republicans decided to kick the can down the road with a major punt and because they have repeatedly walked away from the table. This is just a historical record. We were all here for it. We saw what happened. Perhaps it is worth ticking through once more because I will admit it can get easy to lose track of all that has happened over the last few months
Remember, last year, after a bruising fiscal year 2024 process in which House Republicans made one ridiculous demand after the next and caused one delay after the other, as Appropriations chair, I worked hard alongside my colleagues, including Senator Collins, who is here today, within our committee to write and pass serious bipartisan spending bills for this current fiscal year. It was no easy feat. We had fewer resources at our disposal to make use of, and we had even more challenges to address, but we managed to work together--Senator Collins and I and our committee members--and we cleared all but one of our bills overwhelmingly in committee, and many of those bills cleared on unanimous votes.
Then, come November, after the election, I was pushing very hard to get our funding bills done and wrapped up by the end of the year. My Democratic colleagues and even many of my Republican colleagues wanted to get that done, but Speaker Johnson and Trump chose to kick the can down the road. They chose to. Trump reportedly wanted to make sure his fingerprints were on our spending bills for this fiscal year. The Speaker not only wanted to, of course, please Trump, but he was worried about how a messy funding fight might complicate his path to becoming Speaker again. So the decision was made, and Speaker Johnson punted from December to March.
Then we negotiated a bipartisan CR to fund the government through March 14, today. Along with that, we passed disaster relief, and we extended critical laws. We reached a bipartisan-bicameral deal. Then House Republicans walked away and blew that deal up at the last minute. Why? I will tell you--because the richest man in the world sent a bunch of completely inaccurate tweets, and instead of saying, ``Do you know what? Actually, Elon, you have no clue what you are talking about. These are programs that help my constituents,'' House Republicans said, ``Let's put this guy in charge.'' They killed that bipartisan agreement, rolled out an altogether different bill not long thereafter and punted on government funding.
That is what happened, and that is essentially what they have been doing ever since--cheering and clapping as Trump and Elon got basic facts wrong, broke laws, blocked funding that our communities needed, dismantled entire Agencies, fired veterans, shuttered our Social Security offices, and broke government to enrich themselves.
While Trump and Republican leadership were fixating on whether they would pass one bill or two for their plan to gut healthcare for kids and to pass more tax cuts for billionaires, a fast approaching deadline was on its way to us, the one that is here now.
For the next several months, I have remained at the table, ready to negotiate funding bills. I and my Democratic counterpart in the House, Rosa DeLauro, never left the table--not once. We made offer after offer as did our Republican counterparts. My top priority has been and continues to be doing what we do, what we do every year--every year-- which is passing full-year funding bills with the detailed directives that we include in our spending laws every year. I have wanted to make sure we continue to provide those and make sure that our constituents' voices are heard--that they are heard in Federal funding--which, I have to say, this CR fails to do.
Instead of working with us in good faith to fund the government in a bipartisan way, Speaker Johnson and Republican leadership walked away and started working on a Republican funding bill without an ounce--not an ounce--of Democratic input. I remained at the table. My counterparts on Appropriations and I continued to talk, to keep the ball rolling. By the end of last week, for all intents and purposes, we had an agreement on topline funding, but the call had already been made. Johnson was in on it. Trump was in on it. Russ Vought was in on it. Johnson decided: Instead of talking with Democrats, it would be easier to have Trump get on the phone and scream and bully House Republicans into submission. He figured, if outright intimidation from Trump was enough to convince every Republican to vote for a budget resolution that will cut Medicaid for seniors and kids, then it might also be enough for them to pass a Republican CR, especially if Trump threatened dissenters with political retribution, which, of course, he did. That is the bill they rolled out on Saturday and passed earlier this week.
Now, as I have laid out in depth, the yearlong CR that House Republicans sent our way hands a blank check to Elon Musk and Donald Trump to decide how our constituents' taxpayer dollars get spent, all while cutting the funding working people count on each and every day. It is anything but a ``clean CR.'' What Republicans are pushing here is not a continuing resolution. In this case, ``CR'' stands for ``complete resignation'' because what Republicans are doing here is ceding more discretion to two billionaires to decide what does and does not get funded in their States. It is a power grab CR.
Not only that, it does make serious cuts to domestic funding. It leaves our working families in the dust. We are talking about a nearly 50-percent cut to lifesaving medical research and to conditions affecting our servicemembers. It is a giant shortfall in funding for the NIH. It is a massive cut in funding for Army Corps projects and is $15 billion less for our domestic priorities. This bill will force Social Security to cut staff and close offices and make it harder for our seniors to get the benefits they have spent their careers paying into the system to earn. It creates a devastating shortfall that risks tens of thousands of Americans losing their housing. So this bill causes real pain for communities across the country.
Let me be clear: This bill empowers Trump and Musk to pick winners and losers. I guarantee you they will not only go after Democrats. Inexplicably, House Republicans are saying: Give Trump all this power or we will shut down government.
Well, let's be very clear: That is and always has been a false choice. The reality is, there were other options House Republicans could have chosen, but they chose--they chose--to pull out of bipartisan negotiations and send a deeply partisan bill here to the Senate today. Democrats did not have an ounce of input into writing this bill, and now House Republicans expect us to support it? That makes zero sense.
Let me be clear: In my time in Congress, never ever has one party written partisan, full-year appropriations bills for all of government and expected the other party to go along without any input.
To my colleagues here who want to pass individual appropriations bills in a timely manner for the next fiscal year, how are Democrats supposed to trust that those will be good-faith negotiations after we did the hard work of negotiating overwhelmingly bipartisan appropriations bills last year only for us to see this, today, from the Republicans in the House and only for Republicans to now say, ``Swallow this partisan House Republican CR or it will be Democrats who are shutting down the government''? That is a false choice and one we cannot accept going forward.
When I cast my vote today, I am representing nearly 8 million people in Washington State, and in this democracy, their voices count for something. So you had better believe I am not handing over my vote in exchange for nothing. The choice is not a government shutdown or passing a bill to write a blank check to Elon Musk. That is not how this works. On Monday, I rolled out a clean 4-week extension to prevent a shutdown and to keep government funded while it gives us the time to hammer out a bipartisan agreement. We could still pass that right here, right now. If any Member has any suggestions on what they want to see in this CR, I am all ears. House Republicans may have already left town, but I am pretty sure they know how to get on a plane. That is their job--show up and vote.
The bottom line is, this bill will mean more pain and chaos for our country. I cannot support it.
Please let's remember, Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the White House. If you refuse to put forward an offer that includes any Democratic input, you don't get Democratic
The American people rightly understand that Republicans have pushed this country towards a shutdown. They do understand that Donald Trump has created a massive economic uncertainty and is putting us on track for a Republican recession with his indiscriminate layoffs, his illegal funding freeze, his incoherent trade war, and now by threatening a Republican shutdown.
Democrats did not write this bill. We did not have any input, but if we had, we sure wouldn't have handed over more of our power to two billionaires. You can bet we would not have cut our domestic investments by billions. Democrats did not write this bill, but if we did, we would have protected our public schools. Democrats did not write this bill, but if we did, we would have put our veterans first, and you can bet we would not have prevented the District of Columbia from spending its own taxpayer dollars and be forced to lay off police and teachers. Democrats did not have any say on this bill, but if we did, we would have protected our public lands and your healthcare and lifesaving cancer research.
So I hope my Democratic and, yes, my Republican colleagues as well will join me in voting no on this bill and swiftly passing a 4-week extension so we can hammer out a better bipartisan solution.
I am voting no because my constituents should have a say in how their tax dollars are spent. I am voting no because Congress--Congress, each one of us, not Elon Musk--should decide which schools or which hospitals get funding. I am voting no, and I hope my colleagues will join me.
Before I close, I want to say to my constituents who are frightened and scared: I understand your fears. Some days, I share them. But your voice matters. Speaking out matters. You elected me to be your voice, and you better believe I will keep fighting for you. So shoulders up. Keep the faith. We stand strong, but we do not stand down. We are going to keep fighting for the America we love.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
Madam President, I have the greatest respect for the previous speaker and also for the distinguished chair of the Appropriations Committee.
If she gets her way this afternoon or later tonight, the government will shut down. We would have to call the House back in. It will be a long period of uncertainty in a shutdown. That is the choice we are faced with.
The Speaker of the House has been faced with a very, very slim margin in the House of Representatives. He has had to do a deal that none of us likes, but he has decided that we have a responsibility to govern, and the better choice is to keep the government open.
The previous speaker has had 6 months to try to negotiate the deal which she says we can do now in 30 days. It is not going to happen.
We are here to make tough choices. Today, Senator Collins and I and others will make tough choices. We don't like the choices before us, but that is the way you have to govern.
Let me talk about an easy choice that the Senate will soon have to make, and that is the nomination of Mr. Stephen Feinberg, President Trump's choice to serve as Deputy Secretary of Defense.
Here is the reason it is going to be an easy choice for us in just a few moments. He was reported from the Armed Services Committee by an 18-to-9 vote--a bipartisan overwhelming vote--and he will do a good job.
The Secretary of Defense focuses on policy, on the overall policy. The Deputy Secretary of Defense--the position that Mr. Feinberg will hold if he is confirmed, as I am sure he will be--this person oversees the day-to-day operations of the vast Pentagon by leading its budget process, managing its people, and driving crucial internal reforms. Steve Feinberg is the exact person for this.
Now, under normal circumstances, the Deputy Secretary of Defense requires exemplary skills in management, budgeting, and problem- solving, but today's extraordinary environment requires even more than that--a manager of the highest caliber in that role. So let's look at just two or three items from Steve Feinberg's resume.
He has been founder and cochief executive officer and chief investment officer of Cerberus. He founded and cofounded other Cerberus affiliates and Cerberus funds. He managed separate pools of capital for Gruntal & Company, and he also had high responsibilities in Drexel Burnham Lambert. He knows how to manage huge, billion-dollar operations and to manage people.
He is also a perfect person for this role. He is well-spoken. He is calm. He is understated. He will be largely invisible. But he is the man to help us rebuild the military, reform the way the Pentagon does business, and turn this unaudited Pentagon bureaucracy around.
He will get a resounding bipartisan vote on the floor, I predict, as he did in the committee.
I congratulate the President on this nomination and on the bipartisan vote that we will soon get on a vote that is relatively easy compared to some of the harder votes later on today.
I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 59, nays 40, as follows:
The nomination was confirmed.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table, and the President will immediately be notified of the Senate's action.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will resume legislative session and resume consideration of S. 331, which the clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
Pending:
Thereupon, the Senate proceeded to consider the bill, which had been reported from the Committee on the Judiciary with an amendment to strike all after the enacting clause and insert in lieu thereof the following:
I ask unanimous consent that the order of yesterday be amended so that the committee-reported substitute amendment to S. 331 be agreed to with all other remaining provisions in effect.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Under the previous order, all postcloture time on the bill is expired; amendment No. 1237 is withdrawn; the committee-reported substitute is agreed to; and the clerk will read the bill by title for the third time.
The amendment (No. 1237) was withdrawn.
The committee-reported amendment, in the nature of a substitute, was agreed to.
The bill, as amended, was ordered to be engrossed for a third reading and was read the third time.
Mr. President, President Trump has pledged to balance the budget. I want to help him. I want to help him with this task. But to balance the budget requires much less spending than this current bill entails.
Our national debt now exceeds $36 trillion. That is 124 percent of the size of our economy. That should not be a surprise. We are adding $2 trillion every year to the debt, this year included.
Critics of excessive Federal spending have rightly argued that we should return spending to prepandemic levels. This is something I could support. The spending bill before us, though, spends $400 billion more than we were spending before the pandemic. Spending went through the roof during the pandemic, and it never came back down, and the deficits are out of control. In order for this bill to get back to prepandemic levels, it would have to be $400 billion less. That is something I could support.
Three months ago, when the current continuing resolution was passed at the end of last year, we were told that we just needed to clear the decks. President Trump was going to come in, the Republicans would be in charge, and then everything would be OK. Just wait. Pass it. Pass it along in September. Come March, Republicans will be in charge, and something will happen.
Yet the bill before us doesn't change anything. The bill before us keeps the same Biden spending levels.
We were told with relentless fury that we would fight for the taxpayers come spring, and we were given a bill that doesn't change. It doesn't change the course of accumulating $2 trillion in debt every year.
The powers that be, I believe, waved the white flag of surrender when they presented the American people with this bill that fails to make the cuts that are necessary to slow down the accumulation of our debt.
The malpractice is made even worse this time around. Presidents of both parties pay lipservice to the idea that the national debt must be addressed. Despite tough talk, deficits and the debt inevitably keep rising. We now have over $36 trillion in debt.
Unlike past Presidents, though, President Trump created the Department of Government Efficiency--affectionately known as DOGE--to identify wasteful programs and eliminate them. Despite DOGE working around the clock identifying appalling waste of taxpayers' dollars, this bill continues to fund the same programs that are funding the waste and fraud that have been located.
How can that be? If we have located the waste and fraud, why are we not telling them to reduce foreign aid? If the foreign aid budget is full of all kinds of crazy, leftwing advocacy and nonsense, reduce the amount of money you give them.
This bill will give them the same amount of money they got last year. This bill allows foreign aid to continue. It doesn't incorporate any of the DOGE cuts. It doesn't cut waste. This bill embraces the waste. It allows the waste to continue. This bill doesn't respect the taxpayer. It continues to throw their money away.
This bill continues the Biden levels of spending that caused historic inflation, that caused prices to rise, that caused people to be outraged, to vote for a new President. Why in the world would we continue the same spending levels that led to the debt that led to the inflation that is plaguing us?
This malpractice is compounded by the fact that President Trump and DOGE made it easy for Congress to fix. They actually told us where the waste was and where the waste and abuse was and told us how to root it out, how to remove it.
The waste found by DOGE truly shocks the conscience. Taxpayers paid $25,000 for an LGBT trans opera in Colombia. They spent $2 million on sex changes in Guatemala. They spent $1.5 million advancing DEI initiatives in Serbia. They spent $6 million on tourism in Egypt. They spent $32,000 for a transgender comic book in Peru.
Some of the USAID's programs have actually gone beyond woke absurdity into pouring money and support to people who are the enemies of the United States. The Agency provided millions of dollars to EcoHealth, which funded the dangerous research in Wuhan which, in all likelihood, created and caused the pandemic.
From this account, also, millions of dollars went to support agriculture in
And yet, even after all that DOGE has uncovered--and I commend them-- Congress is still on the verge of passing a bill that fully funds foreign aid. Many in this Chamber think it is wasteful to do all these things, and they say: Well, why should we keep spending money on foreign aid that is paying for sex changes in Guatemala? And yet the funding levels in this bill stay the same. These are the same funding levels for the foreign aid that were occurring under the Biden administration.
Let me say that again and clearly: This bill fully funds the outrageous foreign aid programs that Elon Musk and DOGE have exposed. Something doesn't make sense here.
While Congress seems slow to open its eyes to waste and abuse, Secretary Rubio has acted. He recently said that the United States is canceling 83 percent of the foreign aid contracts. I am for that. In fact, that is what my amendment will do. My amendment will take the contracts--the dollar amount of the contracts--that President Trump and Secretary Rubio have canceled and put them into language so they don't get funded. Why in the world would we not be for getting rid of the funding for the crazy programs we are trying to get rid of? Something doesn't make sense here.
President Trump and his team identified the cuts that need to be made, but it is ultimately Congress, not the Executive, that has the power of the purse. Congress has to act to make the cuts identified by the administration a reality. And on that score, the bill under consideration today is a disappointment. The bill is a disappointment to those who believe that congressional leadership should have used the 3 months since they came into office, since DOGE and Elon Musk have identified this waste--they should have used that waste and incorporated it into the spending bill.
None of the DOGE cuts, none of Elon Musk's suggestions, have been incorporated into the spending bill. The spending bill continues spending at the Biden levels. When everybody wakes up and scratches their head and says, ``What happened here?'' the spending will lead to $2 trillion in debt. People will wake up and say: Well, what about all those cuts? What happened? I thought we were cutting out waste and fraud. And come September, the deficit for the year will be $2 trillion. Because we are not actually cutting the spending. Congress has to do the heavy lifting.
We owe the American people an answer to this question: Exactly how many Republican seats are required in Congress to achieve a majority that will actually fight to lower government spending?
I don't think the taxpayers need to wait for that fight any longer. I am not willing to say: Oh, just wait, young man. Wait for another day. We will be fixing this 6 months from now.
It never comes. This is the story of this place: Wait until another day. Wait until the sun shines; we will finally cut some spending.
It never comes. Someone must make a stand and fight. To that end, I offer a DOGE cuts 1.0 amendment that would codify the cuts in foreign aid, reducing USAID's budget by 83 percent and aligning with Secretary Rubio's recent decision to eliminate thousands of these programs.
So what I am doing is not inconsistent with the Trump administration; what I am doing is in support of the Trump administration. What I am doing is taking the preliminary cuts that Secretary Rubio has given to foreign aid and making them law.
Why? Because the whole judiciary is opposing the President. They are telling him he can't fire people, that he can't cut spending. He needs Congress to step up and do their job. The people who support the President need to be supporting the President's cuts. They need to be supporting an amendment--DOGE 1.0--that puts those cuts into law.
I am not even talking about codifying all of the cuts. I am only taking a small sliver of them in foreign aid. This is the low-hanging fruit. This is the worst of the worst. This is $3 million for girl- centric climate change in Brazil. This is $4.8 million for social media influencers in Ukraine. This is hundreds of thousands of dollars spent sending Ukrainian fashion designers to the Paris fashion show. This is waste--utter and simple waste--and it ought to be cut.
Why would people tell you publicly they are for it and then vote against it? It doesn't seem to make any sense. What my amendment does is put DOGE's findings into action, eliminating much of the funding for an Agency that spent tax dollars on woke entertainment and advocacy. It sets in law the reductions that the Trump administration has made known to be necessary.
I applaud DOGE's work to uncover these many instances of abuse of taxpayer dollars, and it is now Congress's turn to make the cuts stick. If we do not adopt my amendment, then taxpayers will simply continue spending substantial amounts of money to defund components of the government rather than using savings to pay down our mounting debt. In other words, you might cut it and think it is cut one day; but what if the courts say you have to spend it somewhere else? It never comes back. The cuts are never real. The only way the cuts the administration is making will ever be real, will ever be counted, will ever lessen the debt in the country is to vote in Congress. That is what this is about.
It would be the height of hypocrisy for Congress to pay lipservice to DOGE's exceptional work, support it on the superficial, and then vote against it when you have a chance to vote on it.
Continuing to spend at this bill's level will add $2 trillion in debt. That is a fact. All the newspapers reporting yesterday--it was all over the news: record-setting accumulation of debt.
We have accumulated over a trillion, and we are not halfway through the year. It is a record accumulation of debt. It only stops when people stand up and say: Enough is enough.
The least we can do is make sure that it doesn't include the egregious spending that has come from the foreign aid, the craziness, the sex change operations in Guatemala, trans operas, trans comic books. All of these ludicrous things that no American supports will only go away and will only go away with permanence if we vote for it.
Before us is a chance to enact about $16 billion worth of DOGE's cuts in foreign aid. These cuts are only real in the long term if they are reflected in congressional action. If we continue to fund the Federal Government at the Biden administration levels, which is what this bill does, then the money from DOGE's hard-found savings will just be spent somewhere else.
I urge all of my colleagues who have praised DOGE's work to match their actions to their words and vote yes on this amendment.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
Mr. President, notwithstanding rule XXII, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Wyden, Senator Sanders, and Senator Scott be recognized for up to 25 minutes, and that following their remarks, the majority leader be recognized.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, I come to the floor with my colleague from Vermont Senator Sanders to pass a set of critical improvements to America's healthcare system. This legislation is overwhelmingly bipartisan, fully paid for, and targeted at two objectives every Senator ought to support: improving healthcare for Americans and cracking down on the middlemen who take advantage of the system.
Mr. President, 597 days ago, the Senate Finance Committee passed the most comprehensive legislation in history to address the pharmacy benefit managers' predatory business practices, and it was passed by a vote of 26 to 1. And 493 days ago, the Senate Finance Committee passed another piece of healthcare legislation that improves
These policies are too important to leave behind due to an unrelated disagreement. Community pharmacists are counting on this legislation. Doctors who don't want to see a pay cut are counting on this legislation. Seniors and working families who want better care at a lower cost are counting on this legislation. So the time to act is now.
In December, Democrats and Republicans struck a deal on this bill. I have the press release on my website to prove it. It was introduced in the House and set for passage. But along came Elon Musk and his now familiar wrecking ball. With one tweet, he killed the entire package for reasons that had nothing to do with the bill before the Senate today.
Musk even had the gall to tweet, ``What is a `pharmacy benefit manager'?'' less than 2 weeks after he single-handedly killed the bill.
While this unelected billionaire rifles through Americans' private information and earned benefits, claiming to be looking for waste, fraud, and abuse, he doesn't even know about the middlemen who skim billions off the Federal Government.
Since Musk's tweeting adventure, 237 independent pharmacies have closed their doors. That is nearly three small businesses closing every day. Our bill includes critical protections that stop the giant PBMs from bullying even more local pharmacies into the abyss. Every day matters. That is why it is critical to act now.
Now, I would like to yield to the ranking member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Senator Sanders, so he can explain the important pieces of this bill that are in his committee's jurisdiction that also need to pass as soon as possible.
Mr. President, let me thank Senator Wyden for his outstanding work as the former chairman of the Finance Committee and now as the ranking member.
I get around Vermont a bit. I get around the country a bit. And, generally speaking, when I talk to a group of people, I ask them a simple question.
I say: What do you think about the healthcare system? Is it working well or is it broken? Is it dysfunctional?
And, overwhelmingly, the hands go up that the American healthcare system today is broken, it is dysfunctional, and it is cruel. And what people understand is the function of the American healthcare system, today, is not to provide quality healthcare to all of our people, which, in fact, goes on in every other major country on Earth. It is to make huge profits for the drug companies and the insurance companies.
The current healthcare system is a system in which we spend twice as much per capita on healthcare as do the people of any other nation--an astronomical sum of money. And yet despite all that money, 85 million Americans are uninsured or underinsured, and the cost of healthcare keeps going up every single year. One out of four Americans cannot afford the costs of the drugs that their doctors prescribe. And, unbelievably, it is a system in which 60,000 Americans die each year because they can't get to a doctor on time.
It is a system in which we don't have enough doctors, we don't have enough nurses, we don't have enough dentists, and we don't have enough pharmacists. But the good news is the insurance companies and the drug companies are making huge profits.
The current healthcare system is a system in which our life expectancy is lower than in any other major country, and if you are working class in America, you are going to live 7 years of shorter life than if you are wealthy.
It is a system in which some 500,000 people go bankrupt each year because of medically related debt. It is a system where, in large parts of our country, rural hospitals are being shut down and where people even with decent insurance have to travel hours in order to find a doctor.
As Senator Wyden indicated, in December, after months and months of difficult negotiations--and I want to congratulate Senator Wyden, Senator Crapo, and all of the people involved in those negotiations--we made some progress on this healthcare crisis by coming together on a bipartisan and bicameral agreement on a healthcare package.
That legislation, while more modest than I would have wanted, would have provided $4.5 billion for community health centers this year and $4.6 billion next year, up 15 percent from a few years ago.
Community health centers provide primary healthcare to 32 million Americans--working-class, lower income people. They do a phenomenal job, but they are under financial stress.
That legislation would have provided $350 million a year, over 2 years, for the National Health Service Corps, so we can attract young people to go out and work--young doctors to work in underserved areas. And it would have provided $300 million a year for teaching health centers.
It would have also lowered the outrageous price of prescription drugs by taking on the greed of pharmacy benefit managers.
It was a bipartisan bill. And just before that bill was going to be passed, Elon Musk, the wealthiest man in the world, who does not have to worry about whether he and his friends can afford healthcare, he sent out a series of tweets--some of them outrageously dishonest--to kill this legislation, and he succeeded in doing so.
So, today, it is important that we take a step forward and undo the damage that Mr. Musk caused, and the legislation that we are proposing today would, in fact, begin to take us back where we were. It would increase funding for community health centers and do all of the other important work that Senator Wyden wanted.
We have a healthcare crisis in America today. The CR that we are going to be voting on in a little while will make a bad situation worse. This is an opportunity to tell the American people that we are aware of the healthcare crisis; we are at least trying to do something.
Mr. President, very briefly, I want to thank my colleague. We have been working, as we have indicated, for months and months, because Americans, with respect to healthcare, feel like they are getting hit by a wrecking ball here in terms of the costs and inability to get quality care.
So with that, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate Committee on Finance be discharged from further consideration of S. 891 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; that the Wyden substitute amendment, which is at the desk, be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
We have a healthcare crisis--85 million uninsured or underinsured, people dying because they can't afford healthcare. We pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. We have reached a bipartisan conclusion to go forward in a modest way, but it would have some impact in approving healthcare in America, and my Republican colleague objects. That is about it.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the cloture motion with respect to the motion to proceed to H.R. 1968 be withdrawn and that the motion to proceed to H.R. 1968 be agreed to; further, if cloture is filed on H.R. 1968, the Senate immediately vote on the motion to invoke cloture, and if cloture is invoked, the only amendments in order to H.R. 1968 be the following: Merkley No. 1273, Duckworth No. 1274, Van Hollen No. 1272, and Paul No. 1266; that the Senate vote on adoption of the amendments in the order listed, with 60- affirmative votes required for adoption with the exception of the Paul amendment; that there be 2 minutes for debate, equally divided, prior to each vote; further, that upon disposition of the Paul amendment, all postcloture time be expired, the bill be considered read a third time, and the Senate vote on passage of the bill as amended, if amended, all without further intervening action or debate; further, that following disposition of H.R. 1968, the Senate proceed to immediate consideration of S. 1077; that there be up to 10 minutes for debate on the bill, equally divided between the two leaders or their designees; that upon the use or yielding back of time, the bill be considered read a third time and the Senate vote on passage, with no amendments or motions in order to the bill, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate; finally, following disposition of S. 1077, notwithstanding rule XXII, the Senate resume executive session and vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the Phelan nomination; and if cloture is invoked on the Phelan nomination, all postcloture time be expired and the Senate immediately vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the Landau nomination; and if cloture is invoked on the Landau nomination, all postcloture time be expired and the Senate vote on confirmation of the nominations at a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the Democratic leader no earlier than Monday, March 24.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, before we finish today, I would like to say that soon, the Senate will vote on a bipartisan piece of legislation that will make an important DC funding fix.
This legislation will make sure that we take care of the residents of the District; that we will support law enforcement and firefighters and teachers and city services. The legislation is very good news for the residents of the District of Columbia. I am happy we are passing the bill today.
I thank my colleagues for working quickly to bring this bill to the floor. Once the Senate acts, we urge the House to act quickly.
Government funding expires at midnight tonight, and the vote before us is a Hobson's choice. The CR bill is a bad bill, but as bad as the CR is, I believe that allowing Donald Trump to take even more power via a government shutdown is a far worse option.
A shutdown would allow DOGE to shift into overdrive. It would give Donald Trump and DOGE the keys to the city, the State, and country, and that is a far worse alternative.
I want to remind everyone that it was Republicans who pushed this false shutdown choice. Their inability to govern has led us to this precipice. Our caucus Members have two bad choices. Different Senators will come down on different sides of the question, but that does not mean that any Senate Democrat supports a shutdown.
Whatever the outcome, our caucus will be united in our determination to continue the long-term fight to stop Donald Trump's dangerous war on our democracy and on America's working families.
Now, I want to be clear about what this bill does and does not do. The full-year CR is a law that sets funding levels for the full year. The President and executive branch have a legal and constitutional duty to faithfully execute the CR. The CR does not change the underlying law making the Trump administration's impoundments and mass firings illegal. This is true as a matter of law.
Nothing in the CR changes the Impoundment Control Act, the foundation of Congress's appropriations authority, and the authorization laws that require USAID and other Agencies to exist and to operate the programs as Congress has assigned to them. Nothing changes title 5, governing the civil service, the Administrative Procedure Act, and so on.
One of the reasons I am voting for cloture is for the very reason that these actions are illegal and no new law is needed to declare that.
Mr. President, for information of all Senators, there will be up to nine rollcall votes. I will ask unanimous consent that all votes following the first vote be 10 minutes in length, and that if Senators will stay in their seats, we should be able to get them done even more quickly than that. Everybody be here after this first vote. These are going to be 10-minute votes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on H.R. 1968, a bill making further continuing appropriations and other extensions for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2025, and for other purposes, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 62, nays 38, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 62, the nays are 38.
Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
Mr. President, we have already locked in 10-minute votes for the balance of the number of votes, but if people stay here in their seats, we can execute that a lot more quickly.
Mr. President, colleagues, let me keep this very simple. We provided a lot of funding in the Inflation Reduction Act so that those who have very sophisticated finances and very powerful advisers that try to avoid ever paying their taxes don't get away with it, because it is a fundamental fairness all across America.
Ordinary working people have the money taken out of their paychecks every week. Just because people have enormous paychecks and fancy consultants, it shouldn't mean that they get a license to cheat.
And all of that money went to make sure that those upper income folks knew that somebody might be taking a look at their finances.
If this amendment fails, it will increase the deficit by $46 billion. So I hope all of you who are fiscally responsible and care about fundamental fairness to workers across America will vote for this amendment.
Mr. President, this isn't about spending $46 billion; it is about saving $20 billion.
The Democrats' partisan supersized IRS funding is something we have been battling over for a couple of years now. It is a textbook example of the type of out-of-control spending that President Trump and Republicans have rightly opposed.
Rather than working together to help the IRS solve its massive taxpayer service and IT shortcomings, the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act went to fund untargeted and heavily handed enforcement improvement.
As I had mentioned at the time, the last thing hard-working Americans need is an IRS funding bloat that disproportionately hurts them.
I urge my colleagues to vote against this amendment to provide the IRS nearly two times its entire annual budget in unaccountable enforcement dollars.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on the adoption of the amendment.
Mr. President, what Trump and Musk have done to our veterans in just 8 weeks since Trump has been back in office amounts to a total betrayal. He has already fired more veterans than any other President in modern history--6,000 and counting--for no apparent reason, forcing the bravest people you and I could ever meet to have to worry about how they are going to put food on their family's table next week or keep a roof over their heads next month.
These are folks who did one, two, six, seven tours and then came home and chose to continue serving their Nation by joining Federal service. These are heroes who deserve our utmost gratitude. Instead, Trump and Musk are giving them the middle finger.
Cadet Bone Spurs may like to wrap himself in the flag with one hand, but with the other, he is signing off on the orders that sell out our veterans to line billionaires' pockets, and our warriors deserve better.
That is one reason I am urging my colleagues to vote yes on my Protect Veteran Jobs Act--a simple amendment that would reinstate every veteran who has been fired because of Trump and Musk's betrayal.
If Republicans actually care about our veterans like they claim to on FOX News--
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
Ms. DUCKWORTH.--then they will vote yes on this bill and help give our veterans their jobs back. Otherwise, they are making it clear that they would rather bow down at the altar of Donald Trump than stand up for our heroes.
Mr. President, where was the Democrat outrage when 8,000 Active-Duty Reserve troops were unceremoniously and with no due process fired out of the military without benefits? Where was the outrage when thousands of first responders and police officers, firefighters, nurses, and doctors lost their employment because they had COVID vaccine hesitancy? There was no outrage, there was no call of betrayal under President Biden when all that happened.
The truth is, this bill is pro-veteran. It adds $6 billion to our veteran spending. It adds the largest pay increase for our warfighters in a generation. This is a pro-veteran bill.
Let's stop using veterans as political pawns and keep the government funded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on the adoption of the amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 53, as follows:
On page S1770, March 14, 2025, second column, the following appears: The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 53, as follows: The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 53, as follows:
The online Record has been corrected to read: The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 53, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 47, the nays are 53.
Under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the adoption of this amendment, the amendment is not agreed to.
Mr. President, this amendment shuts down the illegal Musk DOGE operation, which has nothing to do with government efficiency and everything--could I have order, please, Mr. President
Mr. President, this amendment shuts down the illegal Elon Musk operation, which has nothing to do with government efficiency and everything to do with rigging the government for people like Elon Musk and powerful special interests.
That is why they started by firing all the independent inspectors general in the U.S. Government, which just opens the door to more corruption. And they have lied and lied to the American people.
They illegally fired over 200,000 patriotic Federal employees, including 6,000 veterans, and added insult to injury by lying that they were fired for poor performance. That was untrue, and this is why judges are ordering the Trump administration to return them to their jobs.
They gained access illegally to highly sensitive personal information on Americans, and just today we learned--
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
Some of DOGE's findings include that the Small Business Administration gave out more than $300 million in loans to thousands of children 11 years and younger; Agencies were paying for tens of thousands of unused software licenses; and the Department of Veterans Affairs was paying $56,000 to water eight plants for 5 years.
Thanks to DOGE, that contract was canceled. Now the plants will actually be watered for free.
While DOGE keeps delivering more savings every day, Democrats are more upset by the effort to stop wasteful spending than by the misuse of tax dollars.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 1266 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
On page S1771, March 14, 2025, first column, the following appears: The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. A14MR6 The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. PAUL] proposes an amendment numbered 101.
The online Record has been corrected to read: The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. PAUL] proposes an amendment numbered 1266.
The amendment is as follows:
(Purpose: To reduce the amount appropriated for the United States
Mr. President, I compliment President Trump and DOGE for exposing waste and abuse in foreign aid spending. It boggles the mind to think that some in Congress defend spending $2 million on sex changes in Guatemala, thousands on an LGBT opera in Colombia, and thousands on a trans comic book in Peru. This is the low-hanging fruit. If Congress can't vote to cut this egregious, crazy, leftwing lunacy, will Congress ever have the courage to tackle entitlements?
Yet there does remain a significant constitutional question as to whether these cuts need a congressional vote to give them permanence. Today, with my amendment, Congress can make these foreign aid cuts the law.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. President, the Senator's amendment would indiscriminately cut $16 billion from State and USAID, including lifesaving assistance Secretary Rubio said he wants to maintain for the purchase of food from American farmers, programs to counter the PRC influence, and efforts to ensure American businesses are more competitive overseas.
This amendment would cut funding for the USAID inspector general by 83 percent, making any waste, fraud, or abuse hard to uncover.
And it would gut global health programs like Trump, Rubio, and Musk say they allegedly want to conserve. Not even House Republicans went this far.
This amendment would undermine American workers, American businesses, and our national security. I urge a ``no'' vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of the amendment.
Madam President, I am pleased to introduce this bill with Senators Van Hollen, Murray, Alsobrooks, Warner, and Kaine. It has been endorsed by President Trump and also by the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Tom Cole.
This bill would simply fix a mistake in the House CR that prevents the District of Columbia from spending its own tax dollars as part of its budget, which Congress routinely approves. Congress approves the authorization of the expenditure of DC local funds, which are paid for by DC tax revenues.
The first CR that we enacted last year included language to approve the DC's fiscal year 2025 budget, and that language was continued in the second CR. However, the House did not extend this anomaly in the yearlong CR. As a result, unless this bill is passed, DC would have to operate under its fiscal year 2024 budget for the remainder of 2025, potentially requiring $1.1 billion in local spending cuts.
Reducing DC's local funding expenditures will not result in a dollar of Federal savings. Since October 1 of 2024, the District has been operating under and spending at its approved level for the fiscal year 2025 budget. According to the CBO, this bill does not have any budgetary cost to the Federal Government. There are no Federal dollars involved. The issue here is just allowing the DC Government to proceed to spend its own tax revenues.
Accordingly, I urge all of my colleagues to support this measure to correct a true inequity.
Madam President, I want to thank Senator Collins for working on an emergency basis to fix this problem in the House bill. She said it well, so I only want to emphasize two points.
One, what the House did does not save the Federal taxpayer one penny--not one penny. What it does is cap what the District of Columbia can spend in using its own money and based on its own decisions. So taxpayers are not saved a dime by what they did nor will they gain by our fix. The people of the District of Columbia should be able to make these decisions, and if they are having to make a budget with $1 billion less, it will mean fewer resources, fewer firefighters, and less money for schools.
So I want to thank the Senator from Maine for working with us on this. I am pleased to be joined by my colleagues from Virginia and Maryland--Senator Warner, Senator Alsobrooks, and Senator Kaine. We urge its adoption unanimously.
Madam President, I also want to thank my dear friend from Maine. She is moving back up much higher on all of our lists for being willing to step up and help correct this.
You know, we all want what the President wants. The President wants our Nation's Capital to be the safest, cleanest, most welcoming city. DC gets 26 million tourists every year. In 2026, we are going to celebrate 250 years. We want to show off DC and the whole region. If we allow this mistake to take place, DC will lay off cops. It will close schools. It will shut down our trash removal. For those of us in the region who use the Metro, there will be dramatic cutbacks.
Let's correct this mistake. Let's make sure that we show on our 250th anniversary the cleanest, safest city in America. This will be a giant step toward that.
Madam President, I, too, want to thank Senators Collins, Van Hollen, Warner, and Kaine. I am glad we can work together in this bipartisan way to ensure fairness for the residents of Washington, DC.
I rise today to speak for the over 700,000 DC residents who do not have representation in this body. They are our friends and our neighbors. Beyond those who work in DC, Maryland partners with DC on resources like emergency services, police, water, and more. This bipartisan, stand-alone bill ensures that DC tax dollars stay in DC. Again, these funds that have been cut are tax dollars that have literally already been paid by DC residents. All this bill does is to continue to ensure that DC receives what it is owed. So I urge all of my colleagues today to join me in voting yes.
I am joining all of my colleagues to advocate for this bill.
One-third of the Virginia population is a resident of the DC metro area and enjoys this Capital, and 150,000 Virginians come to work in DC every day. They want DC police and services to be well funded. Please support this bill. Thank you.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the bill having been read the third time, the question is, Shall the bill pass?
The bill (S. 1077) was passed, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the nomination of John Phelan, of Florida, to be Secretary of the Navy, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the nomination of Christopher Landau, of Maryland, to be Deputy Secretary of State, shall be brought to a close?
I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker), the Senator from Illinois (Mr. Durbin), the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Hickenlooper), and the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Sanders), are necessarily absent.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 63, nays 32, as follows:
The motion is agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 63, the nays are 32.
Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 44.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the nomination.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of Jayanta Bhattacharya, of California, to be Director of the National Institutes of Health.
Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 45.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the nomination.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of Martin Makary, of Virginia, to be Commissioner of Food and Drugs, Department of Health and Human Services.
Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 39.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the nomination.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of James Bishop, of North Carolina, to be Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:
S. 1083. A bill to provide for certain improvements to the housing and workforce programs of Federal land management agencies, and for other purposes; to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
Mr. President, I have two requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority Leaders.
Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:
The Committee on Finance is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Friday, March 14, 2025, at 10 a.m., to consider favorably reporting a nomination.
The Committee on Finance is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Friday, March 14, 2025, at 10:30 a.m., to consider a nomination.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to the en bloc consideration of the following resolutions, which are at the desk: S. Res. 129, S. Res. 130, S. Res. 131, and H. Con. Res. 17.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the resolutions en bloc.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolutions be agreed to; the preambles, where applicable, be agreed to; and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, all en bloc.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The resolutions (S. Res. 129, S. Res. 130, and S. Res. 131) were agreed to.
The preambles were agreed to.
(The resolutions, with their preambles, are printed in today's Record under ``Submitted Resolutions.'')
I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding the adjournment of the Senate, the President of the Senate, the President Pro Tempore, and the majority and minority leaders be authorized to make appointments to Commissions, committees, Boards, Conferences, or interparliamentary Conferences authorized by law by concurrent action of the two Houses or by order of the U.S. Senate.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn and then convene for pro forma session only, with no business being conducted, on the following dates and times: Tuesday, March 18, at 12:15 p.m. and Thursday, March 20, at 12 noon; further, that when the Senate adjourns on Thursday, March 20, it stand adjourned until 3 p.m. on Monday, March 24; that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of Calendar No. 36, John Phelan, and that at 5:30 p.m., the Senate vote on confirmation of the Phelan nomination, followed by confirmation of Calendar No. 41, Christopher Landau; further, that the cloture motions filed during today's session of the Senate ripen on Tuesday, March 25; finally, that if any nominations are confirmed during Monday's session, the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's actions.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
