Legislative Session
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will resume consideration of H.R. 4, which the clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
Pending:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
Mr. President, the One Big Beautiful Bill provides a much needed boost to Main Street America and to the rural communities all throughout America. It makes key business provisions from the 2017 tax law permanent to provide job creators the certainty that they need to plan and invest in their operations.
A top priority of mine, the 20 percent small business deduction, is made permanent to benefit Main Street business owners and family farmers alike. Just as importantly, the bill permanently restores full expensing for machinery and equipment to boost domestic production.
All of this, combined with a permanent extension of the across-the- board lower tax rates, and the One Big Beautiful Bill is a recipe for economic success.
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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The majority leader is recognized.
Mr. President, later today, the Senate will begin consideration of the Trump administration's rescissions package. Reining in waste, fraud, and abuse in the Federal Government is a priority shared by President Trump and by Senate Republicans.
I appreciate all the work the administration has done in identifying wasteful spending, and now it is time for the Senate to do its part to cut some of that waste out of the budget. It is a small but important step toward fiscal sanity that we all should be able to agree is long overdue.
Two weeks ago, Republicans passed a historic bill, and the centerpiece of that bill is permanent tax relief for the American people. In 2017, Republicans' Tax Cuts and Jobs Act cut taxes across the board and had our economy firing on all cylinders.
Now, we have made those tax cuts permanent, and we are setting up our country for a more prosperous future. And that starts with the American people being able to keep more of their hard-earned money--to spend, save, and invest as they see fit and to pursue their American dream.
I know my Democrat colleagues are pushing their usual lines about this bill: That it is about billionaires and big corporations, not everyday Americans. But nothing could be further from the truth.
This bill delivers big for working families in every corner of this country. It is middle-income Americans who get the biggest benefits from the tax cuts. In fact, people making less than $50,000 a year get the biggest--the biggest--proportional benefit from this bill; not billionaires, not the 1 percent, not Fortune 500 CEOs--everyday Americans, people like waitresses and police
Before this bill passed, these Americans were facing a massive tax hike next year, some $2,500 for people in my home State of South Dakota. Now, they can be confident that their taxes won't go up, not next year and not in the future, because Republicans have made the 2017 tax relief we passed permanent.
And that includes lower tax rates for every income level; a $16,000 standard deduction, something that is used by 90 percent of taxpayers in this country; and 46 million families who can claim a higher child tax credit--$2,200 per child--that is now linked to inflation so it doesn't lose its value.
And we went further than just making the 2017 tax relief permanent. Seniors can now claim a new $6,000 bonus deduction. Americans can deduct the interest cost of a new car that is made in America. Parents can save for their children's futures with new investment accounts.
Workers who earn overtime can deduct that overtime pay. That includes police officers, firefighters, nurses, and EMTs--people who put in extra hours away from their families to keep us safe and to save lives.
Workers who earn tips can now deduct those tips, and that means bigger paychecks for a lot of hard-working people. One analysis suggests that Uber drivers alone will see their collective income rise by $1 billion because of the no tax on tips that we included in this bill. And other tipped Americans are looking forward to bigger paychecks.
A waitress in Michigan said:
America's farmers and ranchers are also breathing a sigh of relief with this bill. Amid some of the most challenging years for our agriculture, in recent memory, this bill bolsters the programs that farmers and ranchers depend on--things like crop insurance and commodity programs, conservation programs and disaster assistance, research and disease prevention. This bill addresses farmers and ranchers' challenges head-on.
Then there is the tax component. Farmers and ranchers will benefit from the same lower tax rates that benefit working families and small businesses. They will be able to take advantage of permanent expensing for new equipment. That means that they can deduct the full cost of a new tractor or a combine or anything else, the year they start using it. And they will be able to take advantage of that provision whether they buy that new tractor next year, the year after that, or 10 years from now. Full expensing is now a permanent fixture of our Tax Code because of this bill.
Our legislation also protects more family farms and ranches from the death tax. We raised the death tax threshold to $15 million, and it is linked to inflation. That means a lot more farmers and ranchers won't have to worry about the death tax eating up what they have spent their lifetime building. It means they won't have to worry about a flawed tax forcing their kids to sell all or part of the family farm. And it means farmers and ranchers won't have to spend their time and money on complicated estate planning to keep their operation intact after they die.
One Iowa farmer summed it up when he said it this way:
We can all feel good about that.
I know the last few years have been years of near-constant financial stress for working families, for farmers and ranchers, and for small business owners. So Republicans set out to deliver relief with this bill. And, more than that, we set out to permanently transform our Tax Code so it supports these hard-working Americans: a Tax Code that supports bigger paychecks and lower tax bills, that enables the American people to save and invest and spend more of their hard-earned money how they see fit, rather than sending it to Uncle Sam.
Mr. President, that is the Tax Code that we are delivering.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader is recognized.
Mr. President, today, Senate Republicans will press ahead with a terrible bill that guts local news, defunds rural radio stations, and makes America less safe on the world stage. And they are doing it all to continue funding tax breaks for billionaires.
Today, Senate Republicans turn this Chamber into a subservient rubberstamp for the Executive, at the behest of Donald Trump.
And do you want to know the most galling part of this whole bill Republicans are jamming through? They have absolutely no idea how OMB plans to apply the cuts.
Don't take my word for it. My colleague the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, the senior Senator and former Republican leader from Kentucky, and my colleague from Mississippi--one who said he is voting for the bill--all say the bill is lacking specific information. And some claim they haven't even been told how the cuts will even be applied.
How can we devastate programs, rip away bipartisan funding, and impact millions of Americans without even knowing how this bill will be implemented?
Republicans embrace the credo of ``Cut, cut, cut now and ask questions later''--cut healthcare for 17 million Americans; cut food assistance to hungry kids; cut good-paying energy jobs and let the CCP, Chinese Communist Party, get ahead of us. Never mind the kid who will go hungry or the families who will lose insurance or the people who will get sick and die. It is all worth it, Republicans seem to think, so long as billionaires and special interests pay less in taxes.
Senate Democrats, however, know that our job in this Chamber is to govern, is to legislate, not simply eat dirt from the Executive and ask for more, which is what, unfortunately, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are doing.
So, today, we are going to have a debate on the floor. Democrats are going to show the American people exactly what Republicans are doing. We will highlight, through amendments, devastating cuts to local television and radio stations across the country, as well as the damage these cuts will do to America's standing as world leader.
We will hold the Republicans accountable through amendments wherever they claim they want to improve this awful bill and make it abundantly clear they have not materially improved this proposal.
We will do everything in our power to mitigate the damage Rs are unilaterally doing to the American people.
Now let's talk about the cuts to the CPB, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Millions and millions of Americans, over 10 million Americans--13--live in regions of the country that will be affected by these cuts, including millions of rural Americans and Native Tribes. And these cuts to local stations couldn't happen at a worse time, with floods and natural disasters front of mind.
When a flood happens, when a tornado touches down, when a hurricane makes landfall, people need immediate, up-to-date alerts to stay safe. And sometimes, all too often, public broadcasting is the only way for people to hear what is going on. It is a matter of life and death.
So why is Donald Trump so hell-bent on taking away funding from local stations that can literally save lives? And it is not just public broadcasting. Cuts to foreign aid will make Americans less safe; it will empower our adversaries. The changes Republicans say they have made to PEPFAR are not enough, and nobody is fooled by the small tweaks to this package.
Let me be very clear: Donald Trump's hatred of foreign aid has nothing to do with making government more efficient, and it has nothing to do with eliminating waste. It is incompetence--simple incompetence-- and cruelty, cruelty based on an extremist ideology.
Here is one glaring example. A very troubling report yesterday from The Atlantic saying that nearly 500 metric tons of emergency food that has already been purchased by the Federal
Again, this emergency food could save lives. It could prevent kids literally from starving to death in places like Afghanistan and in Pakistan. It has been sitting idly in a warehouse in Dubai for months. And because of the administration's incompetence, because of the reckless canceling of foreign aid at the start of this administration, these 500 tons of food will be turned into ash.
This is just one very glaring, very troubling example of how our Republican colleagues are really full of it when they say they want to eliminate waste. They don't really care about that. They care about just cut, cut, cut, slash, slash, slash. Use the DOGE chain saw just, again, so the billionaires can get their tax breaks.
What has happened with this food is a deep violation not simply of common sense, but of the moral obligation to care for the hungry and care for those in need, which our scriptures teach us. It is discussed, and it crystallizes the core issue: Republicans do not care about eliminating waste. They simply want to cut funding and damn the consequences, even if it means kids starve to death abroad. It is incomprehensibly mean-spirited.
But foreign aid is not just about charity; it is strategic. It is about American security. And when Republicans cut foreign aid, they expose Americans to global health risks. They make it easier for terrorists to recruit people in susceptible parts of the world. They harm our farmers and researchers and our businesses. Cutting foreign aid makes it harder for U.S. companies to access new markets. And when the Republicans cut American aid, they essentially tell China and Russia: The floor is yours. It creates a vacuum, which China and Russia are all too eager to step into.
Now, Republicans know all of this. They know this rescission package is bad, bad news, even though most of them still choose to support it. Listen, for example, to the words of our colleague from Nebraska:
Or our colleague from South Dakota:
Consider, also, what our colleague from Alabama said with regard to foreign aid:
Now, these are nice words, but every one of these Republicans--every single one of the Republicans I just quoted--voted yes yesterday, and actions speak louder than words. It does no good to express concern about legislation only to vote yes in the end.
Again, we were not sent here by the voters to rubberstamp whatever Donald Trump wants. We were here to govern as a coequal branch of government. This bill today represents the very opposite of that. It is enabling Donald Trump's lawlessness. At worst, this is just one piece of an evil puzzle. If Republicans get away with passing this bill now, we will likely be back here in the near future with other rescissions that cut things like healthcare, like housing, like food for kids.
Donald Trump and Russell Vought have made very clear they want to keep pushing additional rescission packages with even more cuts.
So it means that healthcare is at risk, education is at risk, housing is at risk, research dollars are at risk, money for veterans is at risk. Additional aid that keeps Americans safe will be in danger.
Remember, Donald Trump and Republican leaders reportedly struck up a crooked bargain: If hard-right Members of the House Freedom Caucus agreed to support the ``Big Ugly Betrayal,'' Donald Trump would reward them with even deeper cuts to healthcare and other things the hard right despises.
Make no mistake, this is a short circuiting of the appropriations process. What the Republicans are doing through impoundment and rescission compromises the legislature's ability to act as a coequal branch of government to reach bipartisan and reasonable appropriation deals that represent the best interests of this country--not merely the partisan wishes of a small band of extremists.
So today Republicans will push the Senate down a dangerous road. They will not only cede power to Donald Trump, but they will also tell the American people they won't fight to protect their hospitals, seniors, education, nutrition funding, public health, public safety, and so much more.
Democrats will continue to fiercely oppose this package. We firmly believe in protecting public broadcasting. We firmly believe in the role of Congress in checking the reckless Executive. We are going to fight every day to protect people's healthcare, their education, the care our veterans need, food assistance for seniors and other kids, making sure the needs of working, middle-class, Middle-American families come first--not the billionaire class.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority whip.
Mr. President, I come to the floor today having read a most fascinating story today in Politico. It is about what the Democrats' strategy is today on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and it seems they are coming here today to defend their wasteful Washington spending.
The title of the article is ``Democrats eye changes to climate spending clawbacks.''
Remember, this is a party who had a President, Joe Biden, who told the Environmental Protection Agency, the EPA, to prioritize climate over energy for the American people that was affordable, available, or reliable. That was Biden's priority; that is the Democrats' priority-- climate over energy available, affordable, and reliable.
It cost them the election because they were the party of high prices and open borders. It doesn't seem like they have heard the message when I look at this, as they are trying to on the floor of the Senate today amend our rescissions package to go after efforts to save the American taxpayer dollars.
The story is about how the Democrats are going to defend hundreds of millions of dollars that prop up the old worn-out Green New Deal, and they want to prop it up in foreign countries. We are talking about pet projects--one quote: net zero cities in Mexico, electric buses in Africa, even taxpayer-funded classes on ``environmental racism.'' That is what the Democrats are going to be protecting and trying to defend on the floor of the U.S. Senate.
But just weeks ago, Democrats said tax cuts for working Americans were unaffordable. No, they don't want to cut taxes for Americans. That is why every Democrat in this Chamber voted against the tax cuts that save people who work and get money from tips--save them $1,300. Democrats voted no--no, we don't want you to keep your tips; we want you to pay taxes on them, so we can spend money overseas on climate change.
Democrats actually voted unanimously to raise taxes by $4 trillion on the American people. Thank goodness we were able to stop it, to block what the Democrats wanted to do to raise taxpayer dollars by $4 trillion. That would hurt every working family in America. They called what Republicans did fiscal irresponsibility.
Now, suddenly, money is no object. No, millions for the Green New Deal abroad, not 1 cent on hard-working Americans at home.
That is the warped priority of the Democrats in this Chamber. They are not just liberal; this is radical thinking. This is completely out of touch.
Is it surprising, then, when you see the Democrats' own pollster say that their party is weak, it is woke, and it is out of touch? That is how American voters view the Democratic Party today. Only one in three middle-class, working families, hard-working families, in America even identifies with that party anymore because they have gone so far to the left and so out of touch with the hard-working men and women of this Nation.
The bill that we are trying to do today in the Senate is simple--to end wasteful Washington spending, to save taxpayers billions of dollars, and to restore fiscal responsibility.
This money that we are clawing back today represents the hard work of American people--farmers, ranchers,
We should never be funding something called vegan food in Africa, social media mentorship in Europe, net-zero cities in Mexico. These programs are unaccountable, unnecessary, and truly out of touch with America's priorities. Americans voted for fiscal savings, not foreign slush funds.
Today, the Federal Government is too big. It spends too much. The bill we are discussing today sends a clear message: The age of wasteful Washington spending has come to an end.
Now, I have heard the Democrats fearmongering about this bill. Let me set the record straight. Republicans are protecting emergency alert systems here at home; Democrats are protecting and promoting electric buses in Africa.
In November, Americans rejected this wasteful Washington spending. This week, Republicans are delivering on that mandate.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic whip.
Mr. President, I wanted to check on the bill that we are considering today, H.R. 4. I just heard the Senator from Wyoming, my colleague and friend, talk about a lot of programs that are part of the Democratic alternative. This bill contains no reference whatsoever to the projects that he is mentioning. I don't know where they came from. They certainly are news to me.
But I do know what this bill does, and I know what it is going to mean to Wyoming and Illinois and Oklahoma and Washington and even the State of Hawaii. You see, National Public Radio and public broadcasting are opportunities for Americans to learn information that is critical to their lives and their futures and their businesses and their farms.
Do you know what the Republicans believe? Well, I can tell you. They want to eliminate the Federal assistance for this public broadcasting. That is what is in this bill.
I have a basic premise: I believe the American people are entitled to information, and they are entitled to be making the choice of their source of that information. Public broadcasting is one choice. It is one I respect and many of both political parties respect.
The notion that we are going to take what is a miniscule part of the Federal budget and punish the people who are involved in public broadcasting particularly hurts rural areas--rural areas that I represent in Illinois. Small towns and the part of our State that is limited in population count on public broadcasting not only for the news, not only for entertainment, but also for critical information when it comes to terrible emergency weather conditions. Is this something that we want to walk away from?
Just think. Just a few dayS ago, this body was voting for a Republican proposal called the Big Beautiful Bill, which was a betrayal of rural areas as well. I know because the administrators of hospitals in downstate Illinois have come to me personally in Washington to tell me what the elimination of Medicaid and the reduction of Medicaid coverage are going to mean. For many of these hospitals, more than half of the patients are covered by Medicaid. More than half of the services that are rendered by the hospitals are paid for by Medicaid.
A cutback in funding for that program is going to hurt individuals. Eleven million individuals are going to lose their health insurance in the United States. Millions of others will see their health insurance become much more expensive--dramatically more expensive. Is that what the American people voted for in the last election? I think not.
Overwhelmingly, by a margin of 2 to 1, they reject this Republican strategy of cutting healthcare and cutting health insurance coverage in order to give tax breaks to the wealthiest people in America. For goodness' sake, a $346,000 tax cut for Elon Musk? He won't even notice it. He is a multibillionaire. Yet they are risking health insurance for working families in rural areas to give Elon Musk a tax break. Give me a break. The American people believe that is unnecessary.
Do I believe working families deserve a tax cut? You bet. Would vote for it in a minute. But when you are making over $400,000 a year, I think, frankly, you are in a situation where you shouldn't be asking for a tax break at this point, and that is my position.
So that is one of the conditions that we face as we go into this bill.
Eliminating government support for public broadcasting and National Public Radio is a setback in terms of information and choice for American families to decide where they want their source of information.
But I do want to raise one other point that I think goes to the heart of our vote today on H.R. 4. The Senator from Wyoming, the Republican Senator, just called it wasteful Washington spending. Well, I don't believe this falls in the category of inefficiency, fraud and abuse, or waste.
Two weeks ago, the Republicans used budget reconciliation to take healthcare away and raise its cost for 17 million Americans. This week, they are moving forward on H.R. 4 in an effort to eliminate programs that Elon Musk decided he wanted to take a chain saw to.
Let's talk about Trump and Elon's first target: U.S. foreign assistance to the world's most vulnerable people. They have virtually ended USAID, which officially closed last week. What do they say about the program? Well, it is pretty explicit. Trump said these types of USAID programs are run by ``radical lunatics''--the exact words of the President of the United States, ``radical lunatics.'' Elon Musk--a great government authority--said ``a criminal organization'' that should ``die,'' USAID programs.
Let's talk about these programs. You see, despite many lies spread about U.S. foreign aid, such programs cost about 1 percent of the Federal budget--1 percent--and billions of these aid dollars flow back into the American economy. These programs have enjoyed broad bipartisan support, and they help make America stronger and more influential on the global stage.
Moreover, these kinds of deep cuts proposed in the current rescissions package threaten the long-term safety, stability, and leadership of our country as well as growing markets for American goods.
USAID programs stem threats that don't respect borders--pandemics, failed states, dictatorships, and displacements. Their clean water and sanitation programs have provided more than 70 million people with first-time sustainable access to clean water in the last decade-- programs that have a 6-to-1 return in dollars saved in health, economic, and educational terms.
My predecessor in the U.S. Senate and good friend was a man named Paul Simon from Illinois. Paul was a publisher of newspapers and an author who published many books. One of the last books he published before he passed away related to the availability of clean drinking water in the future of the 21st century. It was not a bestseller on the New York Times list, but it was certainly advice that should have been taken serious by all.
When I asked Paul Simon's family what kind of memorial he wanted for his service in the House and the Senate and public life, they said: He doesn't want any statue anywhere. Do something good in his name.
So I created the Paul Simon Water for the World Act. The Paul Simon Water for the World Act provided a limited amount of money by Federal standards to projects around developing nations that provided clean drinking water.
I remember going to Port-au-Prince in Haiti--one of the most war-torn and devastated countries in the world. I went to a local hospital in Port-au-Prince, and the woman who was the head of the hospital said that they had a terrible problem with a cholera epidemic but it was under control.
I said: What did you do?
She said: Well, we ended up building a purification unit and a cistern with clean drinking water and provided it to people so they wouldn't get sick from cholera.
I said: Where is it?
She showed me. It just looked like a sewer lid out in the back of the hospital.
I said: So where did you get the money to build it?
She said: It was something called Paul Simon's Water for the World.
I said: How much did it cost?
She said: Twenty thousand dollars.
That kind of small investment of $20,000 literally saved hundreds of lives in his name, and I was glad to do it. But it also spoke about the United States of America--that this country would take a small amount of money and make a dramatic difference in the lives of people around the world.
I remember going to a village in India. It was a dusty, little village. I can't remember the name of it. There were kids eating lunch. What they called ``lunch'' no American kid would even consider eating. It was a grain formula that had been gathered with water and made into--it looked like a dough ball, and these kids were eating this dough ball with a great amount of speed because they were so hungry.
I looked at the bag that was providing this grain for this basic lunch for these kids, and it said: This is a gift from the people of the United States of America.
I thought to myself, when they pause before they start eating to say a prayer of thanks, they thank the United States for caring enough to feed them that day.
Does that speak well of the United States? I think it does. It defines us, and it defines our values, and that is what is at stake in this bill. That is what we are voting on today--to cut and eliminate programs just like that that provide grain and foodstuffs around the world to the poorest people on Earth.
USAID programs stem threats that don't respect borders. Clean water and sanitations programs have provided more than 70 million people with first-time sustainable access to clean water in the last decade-- programs that have a 6-to-1 return in dollars saved.
Doctors Without Borders is an amazing organization. They have doctors in 70 different countries around the world. They provide medical care in conflict zones, natural disasters, and epidemics. They are already seeing that vital U.S.-funded programs that provide vaccinations and basic health, protection for those caught in war, and nutrition are being slashed.
The CEO of Doctors Without Borders, Avril Benoit, recently noted:
Then she went on to say:
That is what we are voting for on the floor of the Senate today. This isn't just some administrative battle that doesn't have human consequences. This is a matter of life and death for some of the poorest people on Earth. This is the reputation of the United States as to whether we care.
This is why American defense officials have even told us for generations that they support these programs. As they say, it is far cheaper than military intervention and wildly effective. Trump's own first-term Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis said that if we don't fund foreign aid, ``then I need to buy more bullets.''
So let's be clear what we are being asked to do today: rip funding away from historically bipartisan programs that keep the most vulnerable populations and fragile nations from slipping into chaos.
In addition to weakening our standing abroad, these proposed rescissions would hurt Americans here at home. I hope my colleagues will pause and think for a moment of what the consequences will be.
This publication was sent to me at my home in Springfield last week. It is from Doctors Without Borders. It goes through pages and pages of the programs that have been eliminated because of the Trump administration's decision that foreign aid is for suckers. This President believes it is. Some of the people voting today may believe it as well. I don't at all.
When it comes to malnutrition in Somalia, Doctors Without Borders reports that our cutback in funding has meant that patients are traveling as far as 120 miles for care because of the closure of facilities nearby.
The HIV program--I don't know what it will end up looking like, but originally it was proposed to eliminate the PEPFAR program. Now, I didn't have a long list of projects that I worked with President George W. Bush on, but PEPFAR was one of them. PEPFAR was a program that addressed the HIV/AIDS epidemic directly, and it saved lives. Some estimate it saved 25 million lives.
I want to salute President George W. Bush and all of those who supported it on both sides of the aisle. You see, sensible foreign aid used to be a bipartisan undertaking, and President Bush proved that over and over again.
I can go through the long list of projects around the world that Doctors Without Borders has noted are being cut back because of this decision, but I want to make this more direct and more personal.
This morning, one of my colleagues, Chris Coons of Delaware, who has been a leader in this field of foreign assistance, spoke to the Prayer Breakfast in the U.S. Senate. I am not going to quote him or try to. But I will tell you this, his message was clear that he believes as a man of faith, he has a responsibility, a responsibility that goes beyond his family, even beyond his country. He has a responsibility to his fellow man. He believes this decision by the Senate today will decide whether or not we as a nation share that sense of responsibility.
I believe it speaks well of the United States that we come together and take 1 percent of our budget and spend it for the poorest people on Earth. And that is why I believe it is critically important today that we defeat this effort to rescind this spending in H.R. 4.
Consequences of these rescissions will prove to be devastating here and across the globe. I urge my colleagues to stand up against the mindless cuts. Predictably, President Trump said:
Then he said:
Referring to PBS--
It is a political threat. There is no doubt about it. There is a risk for the Republicans who stand up for principle. The President has turned this vote away from a discussion on merits of the cuts--of which there are none--into a loyalty test, personally, because Donald Trump doesn't care about the impact of these cuts. He only cares about the bended knee, the craven Congressman, the servile Senator.
We need four Republicans today--four--to stand up and vote a matter of conscience. I hope they will join us to preserve the strategic bipartisan programs and vote no on this rescissions bill.
Please, today, to my colleagues on both sides, give a voice to the poorest children on Earth who survive only because of a caring nation called America. Our reputation in the world is at stake. Let's do the right thing.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. President, 2 weeks ago, Republicans were jamming through the most expensive bill in the history of the country. And now, they say they are worried about the debt. Two weeks ago, Republicans said $4 trillion in tax cuts for the richest people in the world was nothing, literally. And now, they are saying a truly tiny fraction of that for rural radio is just too much.
So I have to ask: Is this a joke? Are they really that bad at math? First, Republicans were saying trillions in tax cuts were free. Get real. And now they are pretending to be fiscal hawks by shutting down local news and letting epidemics go unchecked around the world.
Here is another math lesson for my colleagues. Republicans could cut every dollar ever spent on the Corporation for Public Broadcasting since it was created down to the last dime, and it still would not cover the cost of the bill Republicans just jammed through. Republicans could actually cut every dollar we have spent on foreign aid since World War II, and that would still fall short compared to the cost of the Republican tax cuts. Republicans could even cut the amount in the first rescissions bill every single day for a year, and it still would not equal their tax cuts to help their rich donors.
So make no mistake, if Republicans choose to do Trump's bidding, if they push through this package to rip away funding for emergency alerts and global health programs, it is not because they take the debt seriously. And that will be just as true for the next package because, let's be clear, if Republicans go along with this package--despite the fact that they clearly have issues with it and despite the fact Russ Vought has refused to answer the most basic questions, even from the Republican chair of the Appropriations Committee, about which programs he is going to cut--if all of that is not enough to give Republicans just some pause and they let Russ Vought steamroll them through this package, don't be surprised when he sends more cuts down the pike. It could be medical research and afterschool programs, maybe heating assistance, workplace safety, road maintenance. Everything is going to be on the chopping block. And all our time here in the Senate is going to be spent on those requests.
Here is the kicker. No matter how many rescissions Russ Vought sends, no matter how many rescissions Republicans just roll over and let pass, they will never offset the trillions in tax cuts they just passed without blinking an eye because you could rescind the entire fiscal year 2025 spending bill twice over, and it still would not cover the $4 trillion in tax cuts Republicans just showered on the richest people in this country.
So however this vote goes, expect to hear more from me on this every time Republicans try to pretend that we do not have enough money for childcare or medical research or other programs that our families rely on.
I have said a lot about how patently absurd it is for Republicans to pretend they are passing these cuts because they care about the debt, but I do not want to lose sight of the larger issues. It is not just Republicans play-acting about the debt that is absurd. The bigger problem here is that these cuts would be devastating for our communities and for American interests around the globe.
When it comes to local news, these cuts could force local stations that people know and trust--know and trust--off the air. This isn't just about a program or two taking a haircut. Trump wants to slash every penny of Federal funding that supports over 1,500 local TV and radio stations. Those stations and those funds reach 98 percent of all Americans, and they are especially crucial for serving our rural areas and Tribal communities.
Dozens of these stations rely on these investments for half of their funding and some rely on it for as much as 99 percent. If these cuts go through, those stations go dark, weather forecasters communities have turned to for years, news anchors that are their trusted voices, local reporters who track down answers their communities need and hold their officials to account will be sent packing, and those stations will go silent.
Do we want our farmers to have good local coverage of weather and market conditions? Do we want our Tribal communities to know what is going on at their State capital? Do we want families to have updates about the local school board on community events? Because this package of cuts throws all of that in jeopardy, to say nothing of emergency alerts. These stations can be a lifeline when disasters strikes. They are a trusted source of information and sometimes the only source people have access to.
When the devastating wildfires hit Southern California earlier this year, public radio broadcasts let millions of people know how to stay safe. When Hurricane Helene battered North Carolina, a local public radio station was the only source of information for many people. And, in fact, many stations use their towers to actually deliver emergency alerts to people's cell phones when cell towers go down. This funding supports stations that play an integral role in many of our States' emergency planning. Do you think our communities should have less warning in an emergency? Do you want to leave folks back home with less information when they are in harm's way? Well, I guess you vote for this bill if that is how you feel.
I want you to know, I am a hard no.
Let's not pretend a secret deal from Trump and Vought to reallocate $10 million is somehow a serious fix to this. It is a tiny drop in the bucket compared to the massive cuts being pushed through here. In fact, it is less than 1 percent of the overall funding that this package would rip away for public broadcasting and those alerts.
Don't forget, these cuts will impact some of our kids' and parents' favorite educational shows--``Sesame Street,'' ``Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood,'' ``Daniel Tiger.'' PBS Kids has a long track record of creating shows that are beloved, not just because they keep kids entertained but because they are thoughtfully crafted to help them learn and grow, to stoke their curiosity, to teach them caring and empathy. Any parent will tell you that is a worthwhile investment, and any parent will also warn you, if you take away shows like this that gets kids engaged and gets them thinking, take that away, then there is an avalanche of brain-rot television waiting to fill that void, content that is crafted not to get kids thinking but to keep them watching at all costs.
We have to save ``Sesame Street.'' We have to tell Trump and Vought Big Bird is not on the chopping block in this country. And we have to send this rescissions package to Oscar's place--a.k.a. the trash can.
Mr. President, I want to talk, as well, about the devastating cuts that this package proposes to foreign assistance. I thought America's leadership was important to Republicans. But apparently, they want to pennypinch when it comes to keeping our commitments across the world. Apparently, they want to save money by letting families starve and kids die of preventable diseases because that is what this package will do.
And this isn't some thought exercise. We have already seen how the first round of reckless DOGE cuts are working out. There is already a growing death toll and a huge leadership void that our competitors are racing to fill--people who needed healthcare, but Elon Musk shut down the only clinic for miles; kids contracting diseases like HIV and malaria because Trump totally upended our global health response. And let's not forget they are going to destroy contraceptives we have already purchased, rather than distribute them.
People are starving to death while food supplies from our American companies are sitting rotting in ports. That is another part of why America's farmers are coming out in opposition to this bill, by the way. This week, 500 tons of high-energy biscuits expired--food that we already paid for, food that was meant to save lives. And because Trump and Elon Musk blasted USAID to smithereens and couldn't be bothered to fix the mess that they caused, this food is now going to be incinerated, even as people we promised to help watch their kids starve. That is outrageous, and it is infuriating.
Is that what Republicans think of as world leadership? Is it leadership to Republicans when Trump fires thousands of State Department workers who keep our Nation safe and make our voice heard in the world? Is it leadership to Republicans when we pull investments out of international organizations and create a void that our adversaries like China will be all too happy to fill?
We already know the DOGE cuts were devastating. We know that. What I don't know is why on Earth Republicans are getting ready today to double down and codify them by passing this bill.
And, no, ``because Trump said so'' is not a good answer, especially when it is clear that Russ Vought is the one steering this particular ship. I am not even sure Trump knows what a rescission is.
But I am sure Republicans know better than to think these cuts will make our Nation strong. I know that because we passed these investments in a bipartisan way and because I have heard them speak out about how much they hate these cuts.
You can go back and watch our hearing on this. Many of our colleagues across the aisle during that hearing voiced deep concerns with these cuts that they now intend to pass today because we all know these investments benefit American businesses that help feed the world. They help stop outbreak. They stop diseases abroad before they threaten and spread and threaten
So it is worth saying, cutting these investments is just downright wrong. We should not be voting to let children starve or die from preventable diseases. We should not be voting to go back on our word to the world. Saving a couple of pennies is not worth losing our credibility or causing millions of needless deaths across the globe. It is not even close.
I want to impress upon one final point, and that is: It did not have to be this way, and it still does not have to be this way. In fact, if Republicans come to their senses and vote this down, we can still go a different route. We can do what we have always done and consider bipartisan rescissions as part of our annual appropriations process. That offer has always been on the table, and it still is.
I have heard Republicans say they don't like this package. In fact, they are trying to dial it back the tiniest bit. I have also heard they don't want to spend the next several months processing these requests out here on the floor instead of focusing on our annual funding bills or any number of other pressing priorities.
So don't vote for it. Work with us to write bills that make targeted rescissions on a bipartisan basis. You don't work for Donald Trump. You don't work for Russ Vought. You actually work for your constituents. You can put them first, and you can vote this package down. That has some real benefits compared to going down the path of this unprecedented--unprecedented--partisan rescission.
I am serious. I want my Republican colleagues to think about this-- and I mean really think about it.
For one thing, if we do things the normal, bipartisan way, you get to assert your say as a Senator about what is getting targeted. It is not just, ``This is what Russ Vought says. Take it or leave it.'' You can actually be part of the discussion and speak out for what is important to you.
For another thing, if we go the bipartisan route, you don't have to get jammed by this deadline. Instead of rushing through these cuts this week, without fully getting to consider and debate them, instead of being told: No, you can't change this; we don't have time, we can all sit down, make thoughtful decisions, and maybe even make worthwhile changes as we go.
Here is an important point: If we do rescissions together through our appropriations bills instead of just letting Trump and Vought just jam them through whenever they want, my colleagues would actually know what in the world they are voting for because let's get one thing straight: Republicans don't actually know what programs are going to get cut if they pass this package. We don't know. It is one of the great outrages of this package.
Russ Vought is just outright refusing to tell us what programs he is going to cut if this package passes. At our hearing with him, he refused to go into detail. He stonewalled us. We asked, and we asked. The chair--the Republican chair--even asked him about this, but OMB would not tell us.
The question is, What will you cut?
The answer has been: Pass it. We will see.
That is why the Republicans decided to protect just a handful of programs without actually reducing the funding that was associated with them because they do not know the impact of this bill. So they preserve funding for Jordan, Egypt, and a few university partnerships. What about our allies in the Indo-Pacific? What about the implementers of these programs in our States? None of us should accept not having those answers. I am sure my colleagues were told their priorities won't be impacted, but Director Vought cannot keep that promise given the scale of these cuts. The math does not add up.
Even if you believe we should make cuts, you should be joining us to demand we actually know what is being cut. If we do this the right way, the bipartisan way, we would know because we would be writing the bill. We would. Now, doesn't that sound a lot better than just passing this Pandora's box and finding out later what got cut?
Finally--I have said this before several times, but I want to warn my colleagues, once again--if you keep going down this path, you are going to further undermine our bipartisan process. We have never--never before--seen bipartisan investments slashed through a partisan rescissions package. Do not start now, not when we are working at this very moment in a bipartisan way to pass our spending bills. As I said earlier, bipartisanship doesn't end with any one line being crossed. It erodes. It breaks down bit by bit until, one day, there is nothing else. Sure, a few Members may be willing to stick it out and work as hard as they can to get a result, but this Senate doesn't work off a few Members; it works off of consensus-building, and the more bridges you burn, the fewer paths you leave to get things done.
So why go down this partisan path? Why vote to spend the next many weeks considering more and more of these packages? Why do it for a set of cuts that is so damaging, a set of cuts many of you have concerns with?
We are at the table right now--the Appropriations Committee right now. We are writing bipartisan spending bills, and we absolutely can and will discuss bipartisan rescissions. Why don't you all join us and make the work easier instead of making that work harder by passing this bill and setting a very painful new precedent.
I urge my colleagues to join me in voting no.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
Mr. President, I rise to oppose this partisan rescissions bill because it represents a complete surrender of Congress's power of the purse--one of the singular responsibilities under the U.S. Constitution. It will hurt America's standing in the world also. Finally and tragically, it will cost lives.
We are considering this package at a time when the Trump administration has frozen congressionally enacted funds, illegally impounded funds, and threatened to cancel unspent funds at the end of the fiscal year. Now the administration is back, asking Congress to ratify even more cuts of programs that we agreed to on a bipartisan basis and, in many cases, that were signed into law by President Trump. I know that many of my Republican colleagues recognize the danger this proposal represents beyond its devastating cuts; yet few are willing to oppose it.
The Trump administration claims it has found over $9 billion in wasteful spending at the State Department and at the Corporation of Public Broadcasting, and it points to some seemingly egregious examples of frivolous spending. I won't defend the outrageous waste of taxpayers' dollars. No one should or could. And if we were just voting on the examples some of my Republican colleagues like to highlight, I would suspect that kind of bill would get bipartisan support. But the longer the administration's examples of waste are scrutinized, the more it seems they may be exaggerated or even fabricated.
Indeed, according to a New York Times report yesterday, Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought's testimony that $9.3 million was spent ``to advise Russian doctors on how to perform abortions and gender analysis'' was patently false in almost every respect.
Even if we accepted all of the administration's examples of waste as gospel, they don't total up to anything close to $9 billion. But these cuts, if we approve them, will come from somewhere.
As Senator Murkowski pointed out last night, we have been given big, broad categories where funding might be cut, but the administration won't tell us which specific spending they plan to terminate. That was evident in last month's Appropriations Committee hearing with Director Vought, who simply evaded my colleague Senator Schatz' reasonable questions about what specific programs he would cut. The attitude he displayed was: Don't worry; you pass this bill, and we will find the waste and get back to you later.
That is not the way to run a government or a company or anything else.
And make no mistake, the likely decisions by OMB and the Trump administration are likely to be as bad as they
This bill will eliminate close to $1.1 billion in funding for the Corporation of Public Broadcasting. This would not simply affect funding for National Public Radio and national PBS; it would result in funding cuts for local stations like Rhode Island PBS and The Public's Radio, which would lose about 10 percent of its funding if this bill passes. The same story will play out in every State, with independent local news and civic discourse taking the hit just because of the President's command of the majority party. That is the flavor, really, of public radio because it is so decentralized. Stations in Kansas are covering local news, local personalities, local issues, and it is the same way in Rhode Island. That will be lost.
This bill is also likely to eliminate funding for educational tools, and in the wake of the deadly flooding in Texas and elsewhere, do my colleagues really want to support a package that cuts funding for emergency alerts?
The bill would also cut $7.9 billion from the kind of global assistance programs that are crucial to our national security and our efforts to compete with China economically and diplomatically. These programs are also the embodiment of American idealism and morality.
As Catholic Relief Services wrote:
That is from the Catholic Relief Services.
The cuts on the table also include $500 million from global health programs, which could affect efforts that have successfully slowed the spread of infectious diseases, along with cuts to lifesaving humanitarian assistance. One proven program that could see drastic cuts under this rescissions package is the disbursement of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food, or RUTF. RUTF is a specialty product to treat severe malnutrition in children and could be impacted by the proposed cuts to UNICEF that are included in this package.
Unfortunately, we have already seen this administration's disregard for the lifesaving treatment provided by RUTF. Edesia Nutrition--a key manufacturer of RUTF--is based in Rhode Island, and it has been forced to curtail production and delay shipments of lifesaving therapeutic food, which has sat in warehouses, unable to get to children who need it, because of the Trump administration's needless slow-walking. If OMB really cared about waste, it wouldn't have this food aid and millions of tons of wheat and other crops sitting and rotting rather than distributing it to children who need it to survive.
These are products made by American workers using domestically produced food to prevent millions of children from starving to death. And funds for RUTF have been included in appropriations bills on a bipartisan basis under both Republican and Democratic majorities and administrations for years.
Also included in this bill is $1 billion in cuts to U.N. contributions and $4.9 billion in cuts to international economic and development assistance, and it threatens funding for global democracy. These international assistance programs are not just helping people in developing nations; they also provide an outsized value to the United States, building the soft power and credibility that make us a leader on the international stage and helps us confront our major adversaries.
If we eliminate these programs, we will be ceding that authority to China and Russia, who would like nothing more than to displace the United States' global leadership position. Indeed, if my colleagues truly want to improve the U.N., they need to recognize that every time the United States steps back from an international organization, the Chinese swoop right in, gaining good will and advantage and leverage on critical problems.
We are not part of the Law of the Sea because we have not ratified that treaty; China is, though. And when we talk about precious rare minerals that are in the ocean, guess who is going to be deciding how they will be allocated and what are the rules of extraction, et cetera. Not us, because we are not part of that international organization, but the Chinese certainly will have influence.
These cuts are shortsighted. There is no other way to put it. To paraphrase the former Secretary of Defense, an outstanding marine-- Secretary of Defense Mattis--if we don't fund these soft-power and diplomatic programs, then we need to buy more ammunition. In fact, we need to buy more ammunition anyway, but if we don't fund these programs, we won't be able to afford to buy all the ammunition we need.
I oppose this package on the basis of both its contents and what it would mean for the future of bipartisanship in this Chamber and congressional power of the purse.
Let me be clear. With this vote, we are surrendering our constitutional responsibilities and authorities to the Executive. We are indeed close to violating our oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution--too close for comfort.
I would urge my colleagues to reject this.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. President, I rise today in strong opposition to the President's request that Congress take away money for public broadcasting and for our own security, in foreign assistance, that has already been passed and signed into law on a bipartisan basis with a Republican-led House and a Democratic-led Senate, at the time, which worked out all the details--yes, compromise is not a dirty word--and now look at what is happening.
This clawback doesn't just eliminate funding for, say, NPR and PBS. The primary impact of that part of the funding cut is going to be at local radio and TV--1,500 local public media stations across the country that receive 70 percent of this funding, jeopardizing these stations that provide local community services.
Stripping this funding is an attack on these local stations, yes, but it is the communities. I know because I know some of my communities that rely on these stations. Grand Marais, MN, the very tip of our State--the tip of Minnesota--do you think all of these other stations are covering the Canadian wildfires hourly?
They do because of the smoke. People need to know the air quality when they are making decisions about what they are going to do that day or the next day.
Do you think people know when, on Highway 61, there is a tree over the road or there has been a deer that has been hit by a car? No. They hear it on WTIP.
Or in Bemidji, MN, which has had some really, really difficult storms lately that took down so many structures and houses, they are able to get the kind of news that they need on that station. Their newspaper is now, for the most part, online. So they need these TV and radio stations that give them the information that they need.
I have had several Republicans from my State write me, former State legislators who are on the boards of these TV stations. They also view it as a way to get information.
At the local TV station in Austin, MN, the former Republican leader in the State senate is on the board. I visited with him recently, when I was down there. This is the place in Austin, in the Albert Lea area, near the Iowa border, where they are able to get their unique news that gathers people together, that brings them together.
Then there are the emergency alerts. Earlier this month, we were tragically reminded of the importance of this--Texas, New Mexico, the fires in Arizona. We rely on this information in local communities to know what to do and what is safe.
This isn't a partisan issue: 77 percent of Republicans and 78 percent of Democrats report relying on public radio for
I think about these stations in Duluth, in Granite Falls, in Austin. Every week, 20 million people across the country actually listen to radio programs that were started out of our local Minnesota Public Radio--maybe ``A Prairie Home Companion.'' They are listening to some of those former broadcasts. They make them smile, and they make seniors feel happy when they are alone in the assisted living.
Or maybe ``Marketplace''--that also started in my State. They are able to get the facts. They are able to get news about what is happening with the economy and interesting stories.
I think a constituent of mine said it best:
In their words--
That is where Paul Bunyan is from--or that is where the statue is.
We must support these vital resources that give voice to important local issues.
In addition are the reckless cuts to foreign aid. Foreign aid and development assistance play a critical role in promoting U.S. economic and national security by stabilizing volatile regions and decreasing the likelihood of U.S. troops being sent into battle. Helping our friends and allies, yes, it is the right thing to do, but it is also smart for us to do at home.
I have, with Republican Members of our congressional delegation in Minnesota, stood up together at press conferences to make sure we keep sending foreign aid--this is in the last 5 years--to Somalia, because we know what the threat is if we just close our eyes to terrorist forces trying to go up in leadership and take over regions of these countries. We know what happens. But if we just turn our backs, you are going to find out what does happen. It is not pretty, and it is not good for the United States of America.
It is certainly not good in our back and forth that we have with China and China's continuing investment in other parts of the world, whether it is infrastructure in Africa or sending food to countries in need.
This rescission would also weaken our global health programs. These programs not only show humanitarian leadership; they also keep us safe. You can't just put your head in the sand and hope that Ebola doesn't come your way, which we were able to at least limit its horrific spread by the work that we did overseas; or bird flu, where we have seen what happens there; or what is happening right now in the southern border with screwworm.
We are having this debate, and we are seeing the grave results of dismantling USAID.
In the midst of an intensifying war in Ukraine, the rescission would also drastically cut funding from the account that provides economic assistance to our partners.
You think about the President's work in the Middle East and the potential for extending the Abraham accords and the potential for a peace deal there. Well, that is not going to be helped if we cut off the foreign aid to some of our only allies that are in the region, countries like Jordan.
Foreign aid is about demonstrating leadership and compassion, but it is also about security.
To conclude, as a daughter of a newspaperman, I know how important public media and the free press are to strengthening our democracy. Hacking away at public broadcasting and international aid is not just shortsighted; it is dangerous. These investments are relatively small in cost yet immense in impact. They strengthen our country and strengthen our leadership.
We ask our colleagues on the other side of the aisle to look at what this means for our role in the world.
We have three independent branches of government. We have a process that--just as Senator Murray, who is here, and Senator Collins showed just last week--can be bipartisan, where we agree on budget amounts going forward. We have the power of the purse. We are article I in the Constitution, and we better show our power instead of just being rolled and being Members over there who are rubberstamping this President.
Stand up and do your job.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
Mr. President, it all started with the stroke of a pen. Within hours of taking office, in January, the President signed what can only be called a death sentence to millions of people all over the world.
Executive Order No. 14169 simply read:
The order directed a 90-day pause in payments, while foreign assistance was reviewed. But it became clear that this was not a process for reviewing or reforming programs. It was the beginning of the end--a wholesale destruction of the enterprise, from top to bottom, in defiance of the law and of logic.
Presidents can save lives. They can also cost lives. And while almost every President has chosen to do the former, Donald Trump, aided by a band of loyalists and ideologues, has chosen, instead, to inflict death and disease and starvation on the world's most vulnerable.
We used to be the indispensable Nation that people around the world counted on for help. People would see the American flag, whether on the side of a truck, a sticker, or a food parcel, and think: The good guys are here. Help is coming.
But not anymore. We are causing death now. We are spreading disease now. We are deepening starvation now.
It is not because it is saving us huge sums of money or because saving lives somehow stopped being in our national interests. All of this suffering and misery is because a few people were hell-bent on ransacking the government and tearing down whatever it is that they didn't like or they didn't understand--to hell with the consequences. To them, the lives lost are just the cost of doing business.
``Move fast and break things'' is the ethos of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. But when you move fast and you break things in the U.S. Agency for International Development, tens of thousands of people perish.
Let's start with how we got here.
Following Trump's Executive order, Secretary Rubio and Peter Marocco, the new Director of the State Department's Office of Foreign Assistance, issued a stop work order on all 6,200 grants and contracts worldwide. They also ordered an immediate pause on new foreign assistance spending. That meant that partners who had already completed work were not getting paid. Contracts that had already been signed couldn't be executed.
Days later, Marocco, along with a bunch of DOGE staffers, including a 19-year-old and a 23-year-old, physically barged into USAID and forced dozens of senior career officials to be put on leave over so-called insubordination. These people were just doing their jobs.
His issue seemingly was with payments that had been approved before the Executive order and were then making their way through the USAID payment system. Nevertheless, the career civil servants were escorted out of the building and locked out of their emails. Anyone who dared to push back or speak up was sidelined, including the Acting Administrator, who was pushed out to make way for Marocco to become Deputy Administrator.
As he and his team looked for not just savings or efficiencies but what they called ``viral abuse'' that would be easy to mock out of context, FOX News stepped into the breach to help. For days on end, their chyrons blared:
In early February, Musk tweeted:
Days later, after carrying out the destruction, he wrote:
And just like that, one of the United States' primary instruments of soft power over the last 60 years--which has done everything from curing diseases to thwarting terrorism--was decapitated overnight.
USAID's success in moral, political, economic, and security terms was made possible by scores of public servants who felt a responsibility to alleviate suffering even if that meant putting themselves in harm's way, but in the end, it was torn down by a bunch of crazed ideologues who saw foreign assistance as an easy target to test-drive their project of crippling the government.
Perhaps abolishing the Health Department or the VA in the first few weeks was a bridge too far. But here was money going to help people in, as Madeleine Albright used to say, faraway places with hard-to- pronounce names. And no matter how much good it was doing for the people whose lives were saved and communities that were built but also for our national security, none of that mattered when all you had to do was make up some lies to justify the vandalism.
It has been only a few months, and already the loss of USAID and its critical work around the world has been catastrophic. More than 360,000 people have died as a result of the cuts--360,000 deaths. And so I will be damned if I let a pundit or a Democratic strategist or a Republican strategist tell me that the American people signed up for allowing 360,000 people to die--on purpose. For what? Deficit reduction? And to Patty Murray's point, 2 weeks ago, they just blew up the deficit by trillions--trillions of dollars.
The amount of money that it takes to save a starving child or to prevent the transmission of HIV-AIDS from mother to child is minuscule. And we do this because we are the good guys. And we do this because it is cheap. And we do this because when we need something from a friend in a foreign land, they would think of us well because we are always on the scene to be helpful.
These are not hypothetical or distant outcomes. We are no longer arguing about what might happen in the future; we are talking about what is happening across the planet right now. People are dying right now not in spite of us but because of us. We are causing death. We have gone from being the good guys--flaws, mistakes, and all--to being a conduit for death and sickness and hunger.
A 10-year-old boy named Peter in South Sudan had contracted HIV from his mother at birth. His parents died while he was young, but medication through PEPFAR kept him alive. That was until February, when, without access to medication, Peter fell severely sick and later died. The health outreach worker who had cared for him said simply:
A pregnant woman in a Liberian village hemorrhaged and began to bleed heavily while in labor, but without gas because of funding cuts, USAID ambulances stood idle, unable to help. And despite her neighbors' best efforts to carry her 10 miles on foot through the jungle to the nearest hospital, she died midjourney, along with her unborn son.
Dorcas, a 10-year-old in Zambia, had gotten so used to her routine of taking HIV medication every night with her mom that she was confused when it ran out a few months ago. Her mom recounted:
In Sudan, which has been ravaged by war and gripped by famine, a mother watched two of her children under the age of 3 wither from malnutrition and die after a soup kitchen that had been supported by USAID closed overnight. Days before he died, the older of the two children had asked for porridge. ``I told him we don't have any wheat to make that,'' his mother recalled, adding that the soup kitchen's daily meal, which the family had shared, was a godsend.
A mother in Nigeria worried about how she would keep her infant alive, having just lost the other twin to malnutrition in the wake of funding cuts. A peanut paste supplemental that had been paid for by American foreign assistance had been used to treat her newborns for malnutrition. She wondered about how she would feed her child, and she said:
There are thousands and thousands of gut-wrenching stories just like these from every corner of the planet, with newborns and children and families and communities. And this is only what has happened in the last few months. Just imagine what is going to happen if we codify these cuts.
We are not going to prevent every death. We know that. We are not going to be able to feed every child. We understand that. We cannot feasibly help every community that needs help. We accept that. But this is something different altogether. This is knowingly and willingly and needlessly inflicting horrific suffering on millions and millions of the most vulnerable people alive anywhere on the planet. And for what? To save money? The idea that any of this is about finding savings while at the same time Republicans are exploding the national debt by $4 trillion to cut taxes for billionaires just doesn't pass the smell test.
To top it all off, the administration is about to incinerate, is about to light on fire--is about to incinerate--500 metric tons of food aid because they let it expire while sitting in a warehouse for months. They are lighting food on fire. They lit food on fire--food grown in the United States, manufactured in the United States, to be sent out to the most vulnerable people on the planet, with a sticker with the U.S. emblem on it. And ``Make America Great Again'' apparently is doing all of that and then letting it rot in a warehouse and then incinerating it.
What the hell are we doing here?
You want to have a conversation about debt and deficits? You want to have a conversation about aligning our foreign policy better? You want to have a conversation about whether or not the State Department--not the USAID Agency--should have been funding operas and cultural enterprises in foreign countries? Fine, we can have that conversation. But I dare you to justify lighting food on fire.
It wasn't so long ago that a Republican Senator stood on this very floor talking about those in his party who claimed that cutting foreign aid was an easy way to save money.
That was Secretary Rubio, as Senator Rubio.
Why is this happening at all?
I worry that there is a very specific and rather dark view about what the United States is capable of. It is a view of our military, it is a view of our economic power, it is a view of our cultural power, and it is a view of our moral authority, which is, the best path forward, as we decline, is to lock it down; is to not engage with the world; is to not project power militarily, culturally, economically, morally.
We are going from the indispensable Nation--and, by the way, this is a real thing. If you ever do foreign policy trips, people hang on the words of U.S. Senators who sit on the Foreign Relations Committee. First among equals. People want to know: What is the United States doing? What is the United States doing? It doesn't matter what the issue is. It could be fighting malnutrition. It could be economics and trade. It could be military strategy. Everyone wants to know: What is the United States doing?
Do you know what has changed in the last 6 months? They are moving on
In Trump 1.0, we could basically be reassuring and say: We will be back. Don't worry. We are going through a rocky time.
Now China is in the breach. China has stepped up. It is not just that America's retreat is bad for us. It is really good for China. It is great for Russia. It is great if you are Hungary. The Kremlin was nearly instantaneous with its praise, calling the dismantling of the foreign aid enterprise a ``smart move.'' Autocrats in Hungary and El Salvador also celebrated USAID's demise.
Now, there is a basic principle in political campaigns, which is that if you are doing something that your opponent loves, you may want to reconsider whether it is a good strategy. The moment we did this, all the bad guys were like: Very smart. Good job. We are very happy for you. Excellent.
China has seized this opportunity with a little more specificity because they have the opportunity to step into this role. They are working on child nutrition and landmine clearing in Cambodia, health and education in Nepal, disaster response in Myanmar, and climate resilience in Mongolia.
It doesn't take a great deal of imagination to understand what this will look like in a few years' time. China will become the partner of choice for countries big and small all around the world. It will have increased its funding to global bodies like the World Health Organization, enabling it to win leadership posts and rewriting the rules in its favor. And we will have facilitated that process.
(Mr. RICKETTS assumed the Chair.)
So that is the background. Now let's talk about the specifics of what is in this package. And this point I want to make really clear, and I made this point in the Appropriations Committee.
There were a bunch of controversial programs that precipitated this effort to cut USAID. Two points to be made: One, the total dollar amount of all of the controversial programs was like in the $100 million to $200 million range. That is No. 1. No. 2 is, all of those programs were discontinued.
This is a budget that was enacted in March. This is Trump's budget. This is Trump's State Department. This is Trump's U.S. Agency for International Development. So there was not a single thing that was on that FOX chyron that Marco Rubio is continuing to do. So this rescissions package doesn't have any of that stuff.
By the way, some of my Republican colleagues who understandably weren't super engrossed in the details--I had to send them a line-by- line of what these rescissions do, and they are sitting there going: Where is the opera in Ecuador? Where is the cultural exchange program or the parade in South Africa? Where is all the goofy-sounding stuff?
And the answer is, a lot of that stuff was made up in the first place. But even if you stipulate to the idea that there was inappropriate spending, it is literally not in this package.
(Mr. RICKETTS assumed the Chair.)
What is in this package is stuff that every--I wouldn't say every--90 out of 100 of us have asked for--have asked for. What do I mean by that? I mean as the ranking member of the State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Subcommittee--basically, as the chair or ranking member of any of the subcommittees--you get a bunch of letters from your colleagues saying: This program is important to me. Could you please take care of it in the coming appropriations cycle?
Now, these letters are private, and I will protect the confidentiality of these interactions. But suffice it to say, a lot of the people voting for the rescissions are also privately asking for me to fund the thing that they are defunding.
So this is all about the momentum that came from DOGE and Trump and some tweets and some animus--real animus--to the foreign aid enterprise.
Let's go through what is in it.
$4.15 billion for economic support and development assistance. Our economic and development assistance is not charity. It is for countering the influence of the People's Republic of China or promoting regional stability. This work is in our economic and security interests.
If this administration disagrees with some of the projects pursued by the previous administration, the good news is they have pretty broad authority to reprogram the money. Like, if we are doing program--I don't want to name what country because it will have foreign policy implications. If we are doing a program in a country, and this administration says: You know, that is not as important.
They don't have to rescind the money. They can reprogram it to China or Russia or Ukraine, or whatever it is. They have that flexibility. What they are saying is they want less money to counter foreign influence.
Mr. President, $563 million for treaty dues. Now, we are members of organizations with whom we disagree. That is kind of the deal, right? Because if we want to be in an international forum--even arguing for our interests, even arguing against other countries or being frustrated with the body with which we are interacting--we have two choices: We can either participate; or if we don't pay our dues, we relegate ourselves to something called observer status, which basically means we are on the outside looking in.
In order to get in the room, you have got to pay your dues to the relevant organization.
That is what we are doing here. We are rescinding all of the funds to all of the payments to all these international organizations. Why? Not because it is in our foreign policy interests--it is actually not--but because a bunch of ideologues don't actually understand how foreign policy works.
That is the thing here. You can have a different view under whatever it is to have an ``America first'' foreign policy. But this isn't that. This is just vandalism, right? I am not having a disagreement with Jim Risch about how hawkish to be or how much to prioritize global health versus something else. We are just literally cutting off our nose to spite our face because what they want is vandalism to the enterprise.
The tools of foreign policy are being shredded. So this isn't about policy unless you think the policy is: I wish my State Department were weaker; I wish the tools in our tool kit were more limited; I wish our ability to prevent war and keep nations stable was less well-funded; I wish that the only tool in our toolkit was military might.
And it is not a small thing that many former Secretaries of Defense have said something along the lines of: If you defund foreign aid, I am going to need more ammunition, because this is the cheapest way to prevent war.
Mr. President, $500 million for global health programs. Now, the new Republican proposal protects some of those programs funded by this account, but it leaves out pandemic prevention, family planning, and work on a wide range of issues; $1.3 billion for migration and refugee assistance and international disaster assistance. This funding supports our efforts to help refugees and other displaced people in conflict zones around the world.
You know, most of us, at some point, out of the 100 of us do some sort of codel--some sort of foreign travel--and this is the kind of stuff we visit. And this is the stuff on a bipartisan basis that we all nod approvingly about ``it is great that we are doing this; it is great that we are providing this kind of assistance.''
And $1.3 billion for refugee assistance is being cut. I will tell you why. It is because it has the word ``refugee'' in it. I mean, that is how they figured out what they wanted to cut, right? They ran word searches. They are pretending it is sophisticated AI. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. But all they were doing was looking for words like ``gender''; or looking for words like ``climate''; looking for words like ``equity''; looking for words like ``refugee.'' And if the program was named in such a way that it mentioned, it just used those words, it was out. Just totally preposterous.
Our contributions to and participation in organizations like UNICEF is being cut. I mean, good luck explaining why you cut UNICEF because I can't--like, I am pretty good at imagining what my political competitors on the other side of the aisle would say. But why did you cut UNICEF?
Are you trying to pretend that some number of hundreds of millions of dollars to prevent starvation among children is like going to do the trick in
Why are you cutting UNICEF? If this is about tightening our belts, why cut UNICEF?
Mr. President, $460 million for the assistance for Europe, Eurasia, and Central Asia. This account funds a whole bunch of bipartisan foreign policy priorities, including energy security in Ukraine that will be cut completely if this rescission is enacted.
If there were programs under the previous administration that the current administration agrees with, good news, they literally have the authority to reprogram those dollars. This is 2-year money. It doesn't actually have to be spent by the end of the Federal fiscal year. They have pretty good authority to reprogram it.
But they don't want to reprogram to something that they consider important. They want to shred the enterprise.
Mr. President, $125 million for the U.S. Agency for International Development operating expenses. Now, this administration is illegally dismantling USAID and functionally merging it under the State Department.
Here is the problem with this $125 million. Yes, it is admin expenses. I have been in the nonprofit sector, and I have been in the grant-giving side. Nobody loves the idea of paying for administrative expenses, but I know for a fact the State Department didn't want this in the rescissions package because now that they have merged USAID under the State Department, they literally don't have the money and they have got to absorb a $125 million hit.
Mr. President, $100 million for the transition initiatives and the Complex Crisis Fund. This is flexible funding in contingency accounts that didn't expire, and the administration can program it any way they want.
Mr. President, $83 million for the Democracy Fund--$83 million. Promoting democratic values is directly in our interest and supporting resistance to dictators--resistance to dictators. We are cutting resistance to dictators. Good for us. ``Make America Great Again.''
Ronald Reagan would be proud. The party of Cold Warriors, the party that vanquished the Soviet Union, the party that claims a hawkish mantle is now saying: You know what, this thing, which is probably .00- whatever of the entire Federal spend and an even tinier amount of the debt and deficit of the United States, let's defund that because it is none of our business if dictators maintain power.
It is a real change in policy here.
Mr. President, $27 million for the Inter-American Foundation. This provides small, cost-effective grants, and technical support for locally led development projects. Strengthening stability and self- reliance in partner countries is in our interests. This is another one that I get a lot of letters from these guys saying: Please fund it.
``Dear Chairman Graham and Ranking Member Schatz, this program is super important, and would you please fund it in the next appropriations cycle?''
That is the private letter that we get. The public action is to rescind the money.
Mr. President, $22 million for the African Development Foundation. The administration says the African Development Foundation's work is duplicative of the State Department's work, but the kind of grants and technical support that the African Development Foundation provides is not available through the State Department.
Mr. President, $15 million for the U.S. Institute of Peace--a creature of stature, a creature of one of the first Senators from the great State of Hawaii, Mr. Sparky Matsunaga.
The through line between all of this is that there is no correlation between the rationale provided by the administration for these cuts and what is actually in the package.
I have talked to Eric Schmitt, with whom I have a reasonable, functional relationship. But we are talking past each other because every time I talk about what is actually in this package, he pivots back to what is actually not in this package and starts naming line items of things that are not in the 8-page rescissions bill.
This is not the BBB, which took--I forget how--11\1/2\ hours to read. This thing is 8 pages. You can go and see there is no line item for $1.8 billion for operas and festivals and underwater basket weaving and whatever else nonsense people wanted to characterize as the U.S. foreign aid enterprise.
This is economic support funds; this is global public health; this is humanitarian assistance; this is helping our friends in Jordan and elsewhere to maintain the basic stability so that there is not a conflagration in a region.
That is what is in this package. That is what is being rescinded from this package.
I understand that there is some obligation as a party member to oblige the requests of this party's President. I get it. But we are still a system with separate and coequal independent branches of government. The problem is: If you don't assert your authority, you don't functionally have it.
So it is true that we hold the purse strings. It is true that we are the article I branch. It is true that we are in charge of whether a bill passes or not. But I will tell you the thing that is most alarming to me is not the bad policy outcomes--and there are terrible policy outcomes. The thing that is most alarming to me is that I have not yet seen in the last 6 months in this final term of Donald Trump what I saw in the first term of Donald Trump, which is quietly--not rudely, not provocatively--but occasionally, this branch of government on a bipartisan basis stood up for itself.
Those guys would say: Look, we love you Mr. Trump, we love you Mr. President, but on this one, I can't be with you.
On BBB, I understand. It is very hard to reject the President's signature policy accomplishment. But this seemed like one where we could have gotten four ``no'' votes. This really did seem to me like one where it would be a good opportunity to stand up to the President and just say: We are going to do the appropriating over here. Let me show you what article I says and what article II says, and we are going to defer to you on lots of matters but not 100 percent of matters.
So my question is: If they are going to have the votes to enact this rescission package, when is it that Republicans are going to stand up for their own prerogatives?
Why would you run for office; would you put your family through all of that; would you go through the difficulty of a campaign; would you go through the difficulty of being a public figure and subject to scrutiny and criticism and all the late nights and the kind of uncomfortable interactions and all of that? It really is a sacrifice. It is certainly an honor, but it is also a sacrifice.
Why would you do that if you don't get to make up your own mind?
I don't pretend to be able to get into the mind or the position of a Republican colleague of mine. I am from Hawaii. It is different. But I do think that there is a point at which it is just not worth it to give this guy every single thing that he wants. And it would be important and it will age well and your family will be happy and your staff will be secretly happy--at least some of them--if, at some point, you establish that there are some limits to the executive branch's power.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
Mr. President, I rise today to talk about two subjects, the first of which is the vote that will begin here in about an hour and a half, and that is on this rescissions bill. I have indicated, I voted for the discharge petition and the motion to proceed last night. For those that may not know that process, voting for the discharge petition simply means that we took it out of committee. Voting for the motion to proceed simply means that we are now on the bill and will be considering amendments over the course of the next several hours to determine if we have Member support to change the bill, to improve it from different people's perspectives, and I intend to vote for final passage at this time.
I am also looking at other amendments that maybe will make the bill better, but I also have to speak to the unique nature of this rescissions package so that we make sure that we get this right, and we lay groundwork for future rescissions.
The only time that we have had a successful rescissions package in modern history was 1992. And that rescission--by the way, for those who don't know what rescission is, it just simply means this funding will be cut. You will not be allowed to spend money in the administration.
Well, in 1992, the successful rescissions package actually had significant cuts, but in every case, it had very detailed lists of specific programs that were going to be cut. So then as Members, when they proceeded in 1992--candidly, I wasn't even paying attention to politics back in 1992 at this level--but when they were proceeding with the rescissions package, they can look at a specific line item and come to the floor, like we are going to do this afternoon, and say: I don't like that line item. I am going to see if I have enough support among my colleagues to take that one out. I will end up voting for the rescission, but I want that out because I disagree that we should be cutting the funding.
In an ideal world, that success in 1992 would have instructed the rescissions package we have before us today, but the reality is, we don't have those details. I am prepared to vote for this rescission package with the hope that I can trust those who are going to make the detailed decisions for about $7 billion of the total $9 billion rescission.
About $2 billion of it is associated with National Public Radio, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. People have asked me why wouldn't I try to vote on an amendment to cut that out. Because I believe that those organizations have drifted over time, that we probably, at some point, should provide funding to them, but I am not going to fight that part of the rescission because at least we know exactly what it is. So Members have to decide whether or not they are OK with it.
I suspect we are going to find out there are some things that we are going to regret, some second- and third-order effects, and I suspect that when we do, we will have to come back and fix it, similar to what I am trying to do with a bill I voted against a couple of weeks ago, the so-called Big Beautiful Bill that I think we are going to have to go back and work on.
But the remainder of the rescissions package really is at the top level. We have no earthly idea what specific cuts will occur, but I am willing to give OMB and the President the benefit of the doubt that they are going to be responsible cuts. There are two kinds of areas that I am going to be focused on, in particular. There is an area that could lay the groundwork for the administration to cut roughly $200 million from a Ukraine support program. It is not the military support program. I appreciate what the President is doing in terms of finally getting to a point where we are going to sustain support for Ukraine. This happens to be a program that some believe, you know, if it is cut could harm some of the nonmilitary aid that we are providing Ukraine. I share that belief.
Now, I have been told as late as yesterday that will not be one of the cuts, and so I am willing to move forward and vote on this bill on the assumption that that comes to pass. However, if we find out that some of these programs that we have communicated should be out of bounds, that advisers to the President decide that they are going to cut anyway, then there will be a reckoning for that. It won't be in this bill, but this is only a small bill. This is a $9 billion rescissions package, folks.
We have been told that through DOGE there should be $1 trillion or $2 trillion in savings. The reason why it is so important to get this rescissions bill right is because if confidences are betrayed with a $9 billion bill, do you really think you are going to have the support for wide-open, ``trust us'' decisions for future larger decisions?
In other words, if my confidence is betrayed here, then I won't vote for another rescissions bill, unless we have that line-item programming. But I am willing to go through this exercise, and, hopefully, we can trust the administration to not go down the path that we have been assured that they won't when they are given this broad ability to make up to about $7 billion in cuts.
Now, some of them are obvious. People are going to say: Well, Tillis, you are worried about--pick some sort of liberal program in some part of the world. Well, obviously, we are not. There are a lot of things that we can cut where scope creep, or fraud, or abuse exists, but some of these programs will have life impacts.
I was in Kenya, in Nairobi outside of Kenya. I was at a Sudanese refugee camp a couple months ago. And what struck me in this refugee camp were these American signs in a maternal ward with children that had distended bellies. They had flies crawling all over them, expectant mothers sick, and they were thankful that they had that condition to bring their children to and to potentially get support for expectant mothers. They were thankful for those conditions that we would find abominable in this country, and they were willing to give the United States credit to give them those conditions.
Those are the kinds of programs that I am imploring the administration to not touch when given the broad authority that they will get with this bill--because if they do, it could be the end to billions of dollars that we could potentially rescind if we don't do one of two things in this bill: No. 1, get this authority and cut programs like I just described in Kenya or Ukraine or get this authority and betray a confidence with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle in a spending decision that was used to fund the government.
We have got this yearend appropriations we have to work on--September 30. We have got to fund the government. Now, how likely is it that Democrats are going to come with us--the only way we can fund the government is to get at least seven Democrats to vote with us at the end of September 30 or we could go into a shutdown.
If I am a Democrat and you are trying to get me to vote and get to a 60-vote threshold to fund the government and you have just betrayed a prior agreement and a prior appropriation, what is the likelihood that they are going to do that? So if we don't get agreement, if I see any rescissions that are betraying a confidence that we as U.S. Senators made to get the government funded, that is going to be a problem for me in the next rescissions bill.
Now, somebody may say I am showboating or doing something else by coming to the floor and doing this, but, folks, I am trying to protect this administration from itself in terms of future decisions that will make our job more difficult to govern here.
I want the President to be successful with these rescissions packages. I want the people advising him to know how they execute will determine whether or not President Trump is ultimately successful.
Mr. President, so that is all I have to say about that, but I do have a brief comment before I relinquish the floor, and I apologize to my friend and colleague from New Hampshire.
There has been some talk about potentially firing the Fed Chair. And I think probably people need to be educated on how--the Fed really only has two things that they need to do: They need to keep unemployment low, and they need to manage inflation. It is called a dual mandate.
Now, some people may actually think that Chair Powell just has broad authority to set policies around that and that by firing him or replacing him then everything is good, that person can make good decisions that a given administration likes. Folks, there is something called the FOMC, which has 12 voting members and 7 members that come into the discussion when we are talking about policies around rates.
Twelve of them have to vote for a rate increase to occur. No one person, including the Chair, can influence that unless there is a consensus. So if anybody thinks that firing Chair Powell is going to change their focus and their method on the dual mandate, simply, they don't know what they are talking about. They don't know how this whole process works, and I hope they do because the consequence of firing a Fed Chair just because political people don't agree with that economic decision will be to undermine the credibility of the United States going forward. And I would argue, if it happens, you are going to see a pretty immediate response, and we have got to avoid that.
Look, I have had problems with Chair Powell, but at the end of the day, I respect him, and I respect the independence of the Fed. And if anybody thinks that it would be a good idea for the Fed
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
Mr. President, I come to the floor today as we consider a rescissions package that would cancel billions of dollars in foreign assistance. It would make permanent the cuts that were carried out by DOGE earlier this year.
That was when this administration gave Elon Musk the authority to put American foreign aid programs through the woodchipper. They justified those cuts by saying they would save money. But here we are 6 months later, not only have they passed a reconciliation bill that increases the national debt by more than $3 trillion, that shifts the financial burden to State and local governments. In New Hampshire, there is going to be a massive cost shift because of the passage of that bill. And for all the talk about saving money, I don't think DOGE has saved a dime.
Earlier this spring, CBS News reported that the Federal Government has spent $200 billion more in its first 100 days this year than it did last year. And according to the Partnership for Public Service, DOGE's cuts could cost American taxpayers as much as $135 billion this year alone.
And this rescissions package is no better. And the substitute that we have seen so far is a gimmick. It claims to preserve funding for global health programs like HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis, for agriculture research, for the Countering PRC Influence Fund, but it doesn't actually restore those funds.
So a vote for the substitute is a vote to cut critical foreign assistance programs. And one thing is clear, while American diplomacy and foreign aid amount to less than 1 percent--less than 1 percent of our Federal budget--the return on that investment delivers real dividends to American consumers and American businesses.
As you can see, U.S. development assistance supports more than 100,000 U.S. jobs. This week, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee minority released a report that highlights what cutting these programs does.
This is the report. I think the Presiding Officer has seen it in the committee. It is called ``The Price of Retreat: America Cedes Global Leadership to China.''
What has been done in these foreign assistance programs helps China expand its influence. Through research and staff travel and meetings with NGOs and foreign officials, the report shows that the Trump administration's cuts to the State Department, to foreign assistance, and to other programs directly threaten our national security and our prosperity.
They severely undermine our ability to compete with our main adversary, China, and they do that both in the national security space and in the economic space.
You know, Secretary Rubio said at his confirmation hearing: ``The most potent and dangerous near-peer adversary this nation has ever confronted'' is China.
It is true. The People's Republic of China presents the United States with a strategic challenge that is distinct from any in our Nation's history. While our competition with China often seems distant from the United States, the reality is the outcome of this competition is deeply tied to our economy, to our security, and to our lives here at home-- because whether we are combating unfair trade practices and the thefts of intellectual property or we are stopping the flow of fentanyl into our communities or protecting Americans from spying and cyber attacks or helping U.S. companies stay ahead in developing batteries, electric vehicles, and AI, the stakes are very high, and the threat to our prosperity and our security is real.
I don't think most Americans want to live in a world where the Chinese Communist Party is driving the agenda. But instead of strength and focus, what we have seen from this administration is a chaotic, haphazard retreat from the global stage.
Oh, they talk a good game on the danger that China poses, but actions speak louder than words. And when it comes to confronting Beijing, this administration has no consistent message and no coherent strategy. And they are eliminating critical programs: disease surveillance and prevention, scientific research, and disaster response.
And now--now--we just had a hearing in the Foreign Relations Committee, and we talked about this. The Trump administration is preparing to incinerate 500 tons of emergency food--500 tons. And the cost of that food was $800,000. It has already been paid for by taxpayers, and it is going to cost another $130,000 to incinerate it.
So talk about waste. That is enough food to feed 1.5 million children for a week.
Thanks to chaotic and inept decisions, cutting funding, firing staff, and gutting key programs, American taxpayers are going to foot the bill for this, and children are going to go hungry.
These erratic, self-defeating policies are in stark contrast to what we are seeing from the Chinese Communist Party, which has been, sadly, very clear and deliberate in its strategy because the PRC is playing the long game. It is using tactics like disinformation, political interference, cyber attacks, and economic coercion.
Within days of cuts to foreign aid programs, China was already labeling the United States as an unreliable partner. And within months, Beijing was replacing programs that we had cut.
So look where we are today. You can look at the number of cuts to American embassies and consulates around the world. And while the administration proposes slashing America's international affairs budget by 84 percent, China is boosting its diplomatic budget by 8 percent. As we cut diplomatic staff and consider embassy closures, China operates one of the world's largest diplomatic missions, with 278 missions. And while the United States shuts down networks like Radio Free Asia, China is spending billions on propaganda, expanding into 80 new frequencies and more languages.
Our first hearing in the Foreign Relations Committee, at the beginning of this year, was on China, and what we heard at that hearing was that the PRC--China--is spending more than a billion dollars a year on misinformation and disinformation campaigns.
And what have we done in response? We have cut Radio Free Asia. We have cut those networks that provide information to the people who China is trying to manipulate.
So while we are cutting counternarcotics programs, China is working with Latin American countries to build law enforcement capacity. And as the administration moves to defund international bodies like the U.N., China has pledged more than $500 million to the World Health Organization.
And, you know, it is so crazy. The administration has been attacking universities like Harvard and saying that they are not going to allow them to include any international students. And what is Hong Kong doing on behalf of the PRC? They are offering places to talented stem students who are looking to leave the United States.
And while we threaten allies with tariffs, China is courting them across Europe, Asia, and the Western Hemisphere.
In May, Xi Jinping hosted Brazil's President and other Latin American leaders and pledged more than $9 billion in investments.
I was with a group of Senators at the Paris Air Show earlier this year. It is an exhibition that highlights the latest in aircraft and aerospace and military aircraft. And when we met with our embassy officials, they told us that they saw the biggest presence ever from China at that exhibition and that China has opened three new consulates in France and over 20 Confucius Institutes in France.
So China is not just looking at Africa, at the Indo-Pacific. They are looking at countries that have been our traditional allies. And what is the administration doing? It is suggesting that it is going to close U.S. diplomatic posts in these same regions.
China is eating our lunch when it comes to diplomacy, when it comes to the investments that we need to make around the world. And yet here we are
Leaders across the political spectrum, Democrats and Republicans alike, have agreed, since I got to the U.S. Senate--and I thought the administration agreed with us--that the biggest threat to America's security, both economic and national security, is China--the People's Republican of China.
We need to come together. We need to make sure that America doesn't retreat from the global stage. And the good news is that, despite the cuts, despite the administration's policies, there is still broad, bipartisan agreement that American leadership on the global stage is essential and that China's expanding global footprint makes us less safe and less prosperous.
So to my colleagues here in Congress who are considering this rescissions package that would codify these cuts, remember this: It is not too late. We can move to reverse the damage that has been done in the first 6 months. We can preserve America's ability to lead, to compete, and to shape the future on America's terms, not on the terms of the Chinese Communist Party.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. President, eight times since 1974, when Congress created the rescissions process, one party has controlled the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives--eight times. It is actually four times Democratic control and four times Republican control. Eight times one party had total control over the elements of the Federal Government necessary to pass legislation. And never before has either party done what Republicans are doing today: pass a partisan rescissions bill, double-crossing the minority party, and canceling spending that just months before both parties shook hands on.
Why? Why has this never happened before? Well, because this is just an old-fashioned doublecross. It is a con job. Republicans and Democrats agreed on spending levels--first, in a bipartisan appropriations bill passed in March of 2023, and then again in multiple bipartisan continuing resolutions.
When a party controls the White House and both Houses of Congress, it always has the power to use the rescissions process to pull a fast one: to agree with the minority party on a budget--because the rules say that you need 60 votes to pass a budget--to get majority party priorities funded in exchange for funding minority party priorities, and then to use the rescissions process to just doublecross the minority by using that process, which only requires 50 votes, to just then cancel the minority parties' priorities.
That is immoral. It is unethical--suckering your partner into a deal in which you get something and they get something and then using the back door to cancel the part of the deal that you don't like. That is bad faith. It is why no party has done it since 1972.
The power has always existed. Eight different times, either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party could have cut a bipartisan spending deal and then used the rescissions power to just cancel the parts of the deal they didn't like. But it has never happened because it is bad faith, because it destroys the ability of the Senate to function in a bipartisan way.
It is kind of like, if you traded baseball cards as a kid and you made a trade with your best friend, and then, in the middle of the night, you snuck into his house, and you took your cards back, so that you had his cards, and now you had your cards as well. Nobody would think that is right. But that is exactly what is happening here.
It will become hard, maybe even impossible--Senator Tillis laid this out very well--to write a bipartisan budget ever again because the minority party now knows that they can get doublecrossed.
And believe me, if Republicans do this now, Democrats are going to do it when they are in charge. This will become the norm.
Sit down. Do a bipartisan deal--wink, wink--and then, a couple months later, just cancel the agreement through a partisan rescissions process.
And, of course, this is now the third time in 7 short months that the new Republican majority has made substantial, meaningful changes to Senate rules and norms. Senate Republicans created a brandnew rule that massively expands their ability to invalidate actions of the previous Democratic administration. Just a couple weeks ago, Republicans walked away from decades of precedent on how Senate bills are scored, and they used new magic math to create a score that hid the actual cost of their budget plan--and now this double-cross.
But this isn't just about breaking the Senate. That is actually, probably, the least serious consequence of what is happening here. The most serious consequence is what is happening to American power around the world as Donald Trump and Republicans, in part through this rescissions bill, destroy every single nonmilitary tool that we use around the world to protect our interests.
When I was, like, 8 or 9 years old, I collected G.I. Joe figures. And one Christmas, I remember being so excited because Santa Claus brought me the huge G.I. Joe aircraft carrier. It was awesome. I was obsessed with the military, like a lot of boys that age--the planes, the tanks, the ships. That is what I thought American power was--the U.S. military--period, stop.
And, of course, that is an 8-year-old's view of the world. The world, as it turns out, is a lot more complicated. You need a lot more than just planes and tanks and ships to protect your interests. You need a powerful military. But adults--in particular, adults who have any experience in national security--know that the octopus of global power has a lot of arms: military might but also information might, economic might, diplomatic might, energy might, and humanitarian might.
This rescissions bill cancels billions of dollars in investments in nonmilitary foreign policy tools, and it is a part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to destroy almost every tool that protects American interests other than our military.
Over the last 10 years, the defense budget has grown from about $502 billion to $825 billion. That is an extraordinary 10-year increase of about $323 billion. Over that same period of time, the State Department budget has grown from $54 billion to $56 billion--a $2 billion increase. If you layer in emergency funds, that increase is more like $30 billion. But you are still talking about an increase for the military over the past 10 years that is 10 times the size of the increase for nonmilitary tools.
This military myopia makes me remember my 8-year-old self because it is so childish, it is so immature, it is so divorced from reality. Donald Trump's national security strategy--fund the military and destroy every other way that we confront Russia, China, Iran, nonstate actors--it could have been constructed by an 8-year-old. It is that unsophisticated.
It really amounts to surrender because as we stop projecting nonmilitary power around the world, China and Russia but especially China--they just celebrate and step into the void.
Secretary Rubio announced on March 10 that 83 percent of USAID programs will be terminated. Meanwhile, China just announced an 8.4- percent increase in its own diplomatic budget for 2025, committing 500 million additional dollars to the World Health Organization over the next 5 years--an organization that the United States no longer belongs to.
As a result of our cuts, standing next to China's investments in diplomatic power, China will surpass the United States this year for the first time as the largest bilateral assistance partner for 40 countries. China is now the power at the World Health Organization. They call the shots about the standards of global health and pandemic relief. China is now the preferred economic development partner for many nations. China is now the dominant force in standard-setting boards for global commerce.
This is a choice the Trump administration is making to make China-- and to a certain extent Russia, in certain forms--the dominant power when it comes to economic statecraft, information statecraft, energy statecraft.
Let me give you a specific example. Today, information is power. If you control information flows, you control politics, you control economics, and
In many countries, Russia and China control the information space. Russian-backed candidates win elections in countries on their periphery simply because of Russian information programs. Asian countries boxed the United States and U.S. companies out of economic competition because of Chinese information programs.
Faced with China and Russia spending somewhere in the neighborhood of $10 billion, where the United States today is spending only a fraction of that amount of money, it would stand to reason that this would be a moment where we should come together, Republicans and Democrats, and dramatically increase our information warfare investments, but, of course, we are doing exactly the opposite. Trump is in the middle of a powerful, relentless campaign to destroy--to destroy--America's global information power.
The Trump administration just shut down the Global Engagement Center. That is the capacity of the State Department to try to counter Russian and Chinese propaganda around the world. Gone. Just gone. The Global Engagement Center was a bipartisan commitment set up years ago by myself and Rob Portman, supported by Marco Rubio when he was a Senator. Now it just doesn't exist any longer.
The administration is dismantling the U.S. Agency for Global Media, the umbrella arm that oversees our information programs around the world. They laid off 92 percent of its staff. Voice of America, the Middle East Broadcasting Networks, Radio Free Europe, and Radio Free Asia are on track to disappear. The arm of VOA that combats Iranian anti-American information--gone. Fifty-four different radio frequencies operated by Radio Free Asia to counter Chinese anti-American propaganda--gone. At the same time, China is opening up 80 new radio frequencies in multiple languages, including in those regions where America is disappearing.
We are handing the world to China and Russia by deciding to view American power only through a military lens. This rescissions bill makes it worse by enacting billions of dollars of cuts to diplomacy, to economic development programs, and likely to information programs because we actually can't see the impact of all of these cuts.
It is all surrender. China is throwing a blowout party as we disappear our nonmilitary power from the world.
Trump terminated tens of millions of dollars from projects to upgrade Africa's power grid. What did China do? They announced $50 billion of new financing for Africa--Africa, a place where the critical minerals exist to power AI and future defense systems; Africa, the part of the world whose economy is going to explode with opportunity--now opportunity that will go to Chinese companies, not American companies, as we withdraw our relationships with that continent and as China steps into the breach.
This rescissions bill, standing next to Trump's destruction of all our nonmilitary foreign policy tools, is surrender to our enemies.
This bill is a doublecross. It is. It is a doublecross. It is going to harm our ability to ever be able to do a bipartisan budget process in the future. But even worse, this bill is surrender to our adversaries who are chomping at the bit to fill the void that we are creating by adopting the national security strategy of an 8-year-old boy.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.
Mr. President, it was just a few weeks ago on this Senate floor that our Republican colleagues, on a straight party-line vote, cut millions and millions of dollars--billions of dollars from investments in healthcare, like Medicaid. As a result, millions and millions of Americans are going to lose access to healthcare. And for what? All for a giant tax giveaway that disproportionately benefits the very wealthiest in America. They called it the Big Beautiful Bill. It was beautiful if you are a billionaire. For everybody else, it came at your expense in one form or another.
Now here today on the floor of the Senate, we have Republicans bringing a partisan bill once again--this time to cut $9 billion in important investments, including from public radio and public television and, as my colleague Senator Murphy just indicated, from very important foreign assistance programs that are essential to American diplomacy and ultimately to American power and interests around the world.
This is not ``America First''; this is ``America in retreat'' or President Trump surrendering.
To add insult to injury, these cuts are coming after Republicans in this very body and the House of Representatives passed and President Trump signed into law provisions that included the very programs we are talking about cutting today. In other words, this is a total switcheroo where one day, Republicans vote for a package that includes essential investments, and the next day, they turn around on a party-line vote and erase the investments that were just signed into law. That will undermine the entire appropriations process.
I have been listening to comments from some of my Republican colleagues, and they say this is about reducing the national debt. I am all for reducing our deficits and our debt. But I ask my Republican colleagues, if you really cared about fiscal responsibility and deficits and the debt, what happened 2 weeks ago on the floor of the Senate? Because Republican Senators pulled all-nighters in order to pass legislation that resulted in the largest debt increase in American history, throwing away trillions of dollars to in part pay for tax cuts for billionaires.
That bill that passed the Senate just 2 weeks ago will add $4 trillion to our national debt. Why is that? Because even after they made cuts to Medicaid, which will throw millions of Americans off their healthcare, even after that, the tax cuts that disproportionately benefit wealthy people were so big that it is still going to explode the deficit by $4 trillion.
Now here they come 2 weeks later to pass this rescissions bill that cuts very important services and very important components of our foreign policy for $9 billion. Mr. President, that is 0.23 of 1 percent of the debt that the Republican Senators voted to increase just 2 weeks ago.
So nobody is fooling anybody when Senators come down to the floor and say ``We have got to do this because of our national debt,'' having exploded the national debt by $4 trillion just 2 weeks ago.
So what does this package include? Well, it includes cuts to public radio. That includes NPR. It includes PBS. Also, public television is cut. So we explode the debt by $4 trillion 2 weeks ago, and this week, we are coming after Big Bird. That is their solution to dealing with the national debt.
If you look at the cuts to public radio, they can have very harmful impacts around the country because in many rural areas especially, people do use access to public radio to get alerts about natural disasters. So this would put those communities at risk.
This is part of a pattern. It is part of a pattern we are seeing in the funds being withheld by this Trump White House that we already passed. Here, we are talking about cutting funds through this partisan process, but the Trump White House is unilaterally withholding important funds for disaster relief.
We learned after the tragic flooding in Texas that claimed so many lives that FEMA failed to answer nearly two-thirds of the calls on its disaster assistance line because the Trump administration had cut so much of the FEMA staff.
In my State of Maryland, a number of months ago, we witnessed terrible flooding in the western part of our State. In fact, some of you may have seen the images of elementary school students being evacuated from their school on boats. Fortunately, no one died in that flood, but the damage was extensive.
We are still waiting on the Trump administration to answer our State's request for some help for those families and small businesses that were hit.
Now, this is a pattern that goes beyond just disaster relief. In Maryland,
We are also seeing this across the board when it comes to global health. I am not going to go through all of those cuts. Some of my colleagues have identified those. I will just say that our foreign assistance is not charity. Our foreign assistance, as colleagues have said, has been an essential element of our overall foreign policy. If you talk to wise generals at the Defense Department, they will tell you that our national security and foreign policy strategy rest on three pillars: Yes, of course, defense and military power but also on diplomacy and development. So, when you make these deep cuts that are impacting diplomacy and development, including, by the way, the 1,300 patriotic State Department employees who were just fired last week-- when you do that, it is our adversaries who benefit, and it is the American people who lose, along with our allies, because those are not giveaways, those investments.
You know, if your neighbor's house is on fire, you don't just sit in your house and let your neighbor's house burn. You go help them out because they are your neighbors, and it is the right thing to do, but it is also the smart thing to do because that fire may be heading to your house next.
And when it comes to issues like global health and the spread of disease around the world, it is the same story: We save millions of lives, including millions of kids' lives whom we help, but we also prevent those diseases from jumping over the oceans and coming to hurt people right here in the United States of America.
But this administration doesn't care. If you look at a Lancet study, they have estimated that the cuts that the Trump administration has made in the area of global health and other important investments will cost 14 million lives by the year 2030, including 4.5 million children who will die. We just saw a story in The Atlantic that revealed the Trump administration is paying to incinerate--to light on fire--500 tons of emergency nutritional biscuits that could go to feed hungry kids.
So I really urge my colleagues to take a step back and not move forward with these cuts. As I said, the notion that this is somehow their contribution to reducing our national debt when they exploited our national debt by $4 trillion over 10 years just 2 weeks ago is ludicrous.
But I will close, since I see the vice chair of the Appropriations Committee on the floor, with just a final point that does deserve repeating, which is that we have had a bipartisan appropriations process, and we have done our very best to preserve that tradition, but when you take an action on one day and we vote on a bipartisan basis for important American priorities, whether in public radio or in addressing global health issues--when we do that one day and the President of the United States signs that into law and then we run down here a few months later and say, ``Do you know what? We didn't mean it with respect to these programs, and we, on a partisan basis, are going to yank them away,'' that undermines trust and confidence in this entire system.
So both for the American people and the important investments that we did make, which they will now lose, but also for the future of this institution and the power of the purse, I urge my colleagues to vote against this bill.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following Senators be permitted to speak prior to votes: myself for up to 10 minutes, Senator Cantwell for up to 10 minutes, Senator Murray for 5 minutes, and Senator Schumer for 5 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, ``Jesus wept.'' ``Jesus wept.'' Most of us who grew up in Bible-believing households know this is the shortest verse in all of Scripture and, in some ways, the most powerful--one that haunts me. ``Jesus wept'' in John, the 11th chapter, 35th verse, because he had come too late, seemingly, to save the life of Lazarus. He wept because someone he knew and loved had died, and it had caused such harm and loss to his family.
Today, we are doing something on the floor of this Senate--my Republican colleagues are doing something on the floor of this Senate-- that I believe would make Jesus weep.
In Luke, there is a moment in the 10th chapter where a lawyer--and it is always a lawyer--comes to test Jesus and, in trying to justify himself, presses Jesus with questions.
What must I do to gain eternal life?
Jesus says: What does the Scripture teach?
He says: You should love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind. The second commandment is like unto it. You should love your neighbor as yourself.
Jesus says: You have read well. Do this, and you will gain eternal life.
But the lawyer, hoping to be justified, says: But--but--but wait. Who is my neighbor?
And what follows is the well-known ``Parable of the Good Samaritan,'' where the righteous, the priestly, the respected, the powerful walk on the other side of the road when they encounter someone who has been set upon by robbers: not my problem, not my neighbor. But in the ``Parable of the Good Samaritan,'' it is this person, a Samaritan, from a disfavored ethnicity--someone outside the circle of concern to the ancient Israelites--who does the right thing.
This parable would have been shocking at the time that it was preached by Jesus. The idea that the good neighbor was the outcast, the unexpected would be something that, frankly, would have been a surprise. So although today ``being a good Samaritan'' is a common term, it is important to know the history.
We are taught as children that we are to see all as our neighbors, not just those who live next-door, not just those who look like us or speak like us or pray like us, but the widest possible definition of ``neighbor'' is what we are called through righteousness to see in the world. What a difference it has made because our Nation has, for decades, embraced the cause of being present, of caring, of making lifesaving differences to young mothers and children, to widows and orphans, to the imprisoned, to the hungry, to the refugee, to those fleeing oppression, to those seeking relief from authoritarian governments, for those seeking a better way.
We are all God's children. And from childhood, we are taught that the Golden Rule, which appears in virtually every religion--``Do unto others as you would have them do unto you''--is the very foundation of the goodness of America: that we care for each other as neighbors and that we care for the world as neighbors. Yes, we are the most charitable, giving, philanthropic, engaged Nation on Earth. Yet all that we do in foreign aid is less than 1 percent of our total Federal budget.
Months ago, when Elon Musk and DOGE began roaming about the Federal Agencies of our government, their first target was that that delivers disaster relief; that helps feed the hungry; that helps welcome the refugee; that helps stabilize countries going through turmoil. They laid off thousands. They shut down programs. They canceled billions. Yet, here today, we are at it again. Republicans are proposing even deeper cuts. I want to talk about one area of the many that will be cut, I fear, later today: disaster assistance.
Our Nation was riveted as we watched the tragedy that unfolded in the Texas Hill Country, where a raging river killed dozens and dozens of innocent children. Do you know, around the world, when disaster strikes, it is the Americans who show up first? It is the Americans who show up with relief, with assistance, with skill and talent and ability. It has been this way for decades, and it should be this way still.
I was on a bipartisan trip to the Philippines just a few months ago with Senator Ricketts, and I was struck to learn that the Philippines, of all the nations on Earth, is the most prone to natural disasters. They value our partnership, our alliance. We have been security partners for decades. There are many Filipino Americans, and there is a close and deep relationship. But in meeting with their national leaders,
Do you know, in the excess of DOGE's deep cuts, they fired and laid off most of our experts who were capable of delivering world-class disaster relief?
We saw the consequences with an earthquake in Myanmar just 3 months ago, where the few remaining folks who did this work were laid off as they were deployed, and, instead, the response was led by the Chinese. We are driving nations into the open arms of our adversaries. We have long been known as a nation that sought to be respected, admired, believed in, and embraced not for the example of our power but by the power of our example; that when there were dread pandemics killing millions, America showed up.
One of the positives of this day is that my Republican colleagues have recoiled from fully shutting down PEPFAR, and that is a positive. One of the best things we have ever done as a nation is to save 27 million lives across the world who otherwise would have been lost to HIV/AIDS.
But I will tell you, when Ebola raged across Africa in 2014, I was the one Member of Congress who went to Liberia at the request of the President--a Nobel Peace Prize winner, a brave and proud leader of a nation that was struggling, that was facing mass losses of life. Projections at the early stages of the Ebola pandemic were that a fifth to a quarter of their population would die in a matter of weeks. And who came to help? It was the Americans, Catholic Relief Services, Save the Children, CARE, the U.S. military, and our Public Health Service.
I will never forget meeting a young Liberian named Alvin. He dropped out of college to become a physician assistant to help when the outbreak began, and he, in caring for patients, himself contracted Ebola, a near-certain death sentence. Yet Alvin was evacuated by the Americans to the Ebola treatment center that had been set up and funded and equipped by Americans, and his life was saved by Americans.
Whether it was the President of the nation, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, or Alvin, the folks I met on that trip to Liberia thanked and praised the American people for our decency, our kindness, and our seeing them as our neighbor in their moments of deepest struggle, risk, and loss. Yet today--yet today--my colleagues would rather trim one-tenth of 1 percent of the budget--$9 billion--to cut deeper into food aid and disaster assistance and in fighting pandemics--all to justify a tax cut. I can think of few more despicable acts on this floor in my 15 years. I can speak to process. We have a bipartisan appropriations process, where we can and should debate and consider these further cuts and put them on the floor and vote them up, but this is an odd thing. It is a rescission. It is a cutting back further of money we have already appropriated.
Just a few minutes later today, I will be trying to get votes to end $465 million of further cuts in disaster assistance that will be on the floor today, taking money from the World Food Programme and UNICEF, from Red Cross and Save the Children, from Catholic Relief Services and World Vision.
Folks may think at home that this money that goes out to the world is money better spent here, but for the pennies on the Federal dollar that we spend responding to disasters around the world, organizations we all know and the majority of us believe in and support--like the Red Cross, World Vision, or Catholic Relief Services--are able to appear in time and deliver lifesaving aid.
Think about what we are doing. Think about the example we are setting. Think about what we are teaching our children. Open your hearts and eyes and realize what we are about to do.
This is a nation of which I am so proud, and yet at times it does things of which I am so ashamed. I cannot imagine the faces in the refugee camps, in the villages, in the clinics, in the schools, in the towns, in the cities around the world who, for years, have been used to the idea that when there is a pandemic, the Americans come; that when there is an earthquake, the Americans come; that when there is starvation, the Americans come.
Today, we will vote, no, we won't. We are more interested in ourselves and in a bigger tax cut than we are in saving starving children--people laid low by the devastation of an earthquake, families suffering by a typhoon. The best part of this Nation, what truly makes us great, is our selfless giving to others.
We will be judged by how we act today, for God's justice is swift and sure. And I tremble when I think about the answer this Chamber will give today to the question: Who is my neighbor?
Ladies and gentlemen of the Senate, we should turn aside. We should not, with this act and this vote today, make Jesus weep.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. President, we are about to vote on this package, but I wanted to first make sure my colleagues understood that we are not just voting on whether local news stations shut down or whether communities can get information in an emergency or whether or not America retreats on the world's stage and break its word or whether or not we let children die of hunger or preventable diseases just to save a few pennies. All of that is at stake here, but there is a lot more at stake as well, like whether we allow partisan rescissions to cut bipartisan funds for the first time ever--colleagues need to understand that, for the first time ever--or whether Russ Vought can steamroll this body and whether Republicans will pass a bill of cuts when they don't even know what is in it.
I mean, really, I have heard Members complain to high heaven about not having time to read a bill before voting on it. Well, this is even worse. The administration has outright refused to tell us what will get cut if Republicans pass this bill. Even the Republican leader admits that. This is a Pandora's box of cuts.
What I want to leave my colleagues with is this: We are not just voting on the devastating cuts in this package, we are also voting on how the Senate is going to spend the rest of the year. Are we just going to do rescission after rescission? Because we know Russ Vought is just itching to send us more. And as you have all seen throughout this process and as we have seen at every hearing we have had with him, he doesn't care if you feel steamrolled; he doesn't care if you want more details; he doesn't care whether you want different cuts.
So the vote before us right now is really about do we--we are elected representatives, all of us--want to write the laws and even consider targeted rescissions within those bills? Do we want to have time to move them on the floor or do we want to spend every day, every week here debating how much of the last spending bill to unravel and whose communities get robbed?
This will not be a hard vote for me, and it really should not be a hard vote for any one of us.
I am a strong no, and I hope all of our colleagues will join us.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
Mr. President, in a few moments, we will begin voting on amendments to the Republican rescissions package. Let's start with the devastating consequences of passing this bill as written.
The bill will starve local news and radio stations so essential, particularly in rural areas, for people hearing about weather events. We learned the tragedy of untimely notification in Texas recently. It was very terrible. It could happen again with these kinds of cuts.
The bill will harm America's farmers and researchers and businesses; make the world an easier place, unfortunately, for terrorist recruitment; and reward communist China and Vladimir Putin--all so Republicans can keep paying for billionaire tax cuts.
And the most galling part: Republicans are rushing forward without a clue how these unhinged cuts will be
Republicans are putting a blindfold over their own eyes and leading rural Americans off a cliff just to make Donald Trump and his billionaire friends happy.
Well, Democrats are not here to merely rubberstamp whatever Donald Trump does, like the Republicans are doing. Today, my Senate Democratic colleagues and I will make clear the damage this package will have on Americans and on our national security.
For one, we will expose the terrible things Republicans have stuffed in this bill. They want to starve local news stations, defund local radio stations, cripple disaster alerts, abandon Native Tribes, isolate rural Americans, and erode America's leadership on the world stage. These amendments will show how the Republican bill makes America weaker while making our adversaries stronger.
I, for one, will push an amendment on the floor stopping Republicans from cutting funds necessary to resist the Chinese Communist Party, beat them in the race for precious minerals vital to our new technologies, and prevent them from spreading their nefarious cyber attacks around the world.
My amendment will also stop Republicans from cutting vital funds to our partners in the Indo-Pacific, who are the first line of defense against aggression from communist China.
We will also be ready to offer amendments that take Republicans to task when they claim they want to improve this bill but only offer tweaks that look good on paper without solving the issues they claim to care about. For example, Republicans say they want to protect rural communities, so we have amendments that will actually stand up for rural communities instead of making cosmetic tweaks at the margin that Republicans might try to push.
Republicans say they stand with local TV and radio stations and want to protect those communities from cuts, so we have amendments that will actually halt these awful cuts and keep these places whole--not some commitment to one State and one Senator from OMB but actually preventing these cuts from occurring across America.
Republicans say they want to stand up to the Chinese Communist Party, to get tough on Putin, and to protect funding for global disease and preventing the spread of terrorism, so we have amendments that will ensure these vital programs are not cut.
If Republicans oppose these commonsense amendments, they are simply not serious about protecting local communities and the foreign aid they profess to care about.
Democrats will also push amendments to mitigate its harms on local communities and prevent Republicans from unilaterally eviscerating funds that benefit tens of millions of people.
The matter is very simple. Republicans themselves have admitted that this bill as written right now is a black box of cuts, and they have no idea how these cuts will be implemented. So if they are serious--really serious--about standing up for local TV and radio, if they truly care about national security, if they say they want to protect communities from harmful cuts, they should prove it--prove it today--by supporting our amendments. Actions speak a heck of a lot louder than words.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, while we are waiting for our colleague to come, if I could make remarks.
My colleague, I so appreciate Senator Murray and Leader Schumer out here speaking on these important issues. But as a committee who has thought a lot about storms lately, we are not just putting PBS at risk here, we are putting millions of Americans who depend on local media for lifesaving information at risk. And what is in this rescission request is really making sure that public broadcasters don't have that ability, at least in 20 States where they have emergency plans.
So what happens is that NPR manages the Public Radio Satellite System. They receive emergency alerts. They tell us to get out of the way. PBS operates the Warning Alert and Response Network, which then transmits over 11,000 emergency alerts alone last year, a 30-percent increase from the previous year.
So why are we talking about cutting off emergency alerts? That is 11,000 times these stations were warned to tell people that their lives were in danger. Let me explain what PBS's warning system means for American families in plain English. When emergency managers, such as someone at FEMA or the National Weather Service or local officials hit send on a lifesaving alert, it normally travels through wireless carriers' infrastructure to reach cell towers.
But what happens when there are cyberattacks or those infrastructures are crippled, when the fiber lines don't work or they are cut in a storm, when disaster like fire or flood or hurricane knocks them out? What happens to the communication infrastructure then? Well, that is what PBS WARN does. It fills in.
PBS stations also on the radio, through the airwaves, because they don't have to rely on physical infrastructure, they basically communicate to more than 340 PBS stations nationwide. These stations, running on backup generators, are built to broadcast through disasters. I mean, I think if anybody has got any history to them, they realize that there has been lots of lifesaving information over the airwaves.
So local infrastructure, like TV receivers, local regional facilities, grab that alert signal from the PBS broadcast, no internet required, and they get the information out to us. This system and these critical alerts are the primary thing that we use in the Nation when everything else goes dark.
That means that every PBS transmitter becomes a backup lifetime line for emergency alerts, ensuring that warnings about tornadoes, fires, floods, and evacuations reach your cell phone in seconds.
Just think about that. If you have this flood we had in Kerrville and you don't have a communication system, the PBS system is the one that sends the alerts because they have gotten it through the airwaves.
This administration--and my colleagues now--want to pull the plug on this. Just look at yesterday's alerts alone on flash flooding in North Carolina, in central Texas, in Arizona, a statewide missing person alert in Kentucky, a tornado warning across Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wisconsin and dozens more.
Why would we want anybody to miss a disaster alert? It could even be about boiling water and making sure that you have the right water. These are all important communication systems, and they are important when cell phones and the internet don't work. On November 30, 2018, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake shook southcentral Alaska. In Anchorage, roads split apart, buildings crumbled, power lines snapped, cell towers went down within seconds, and people panicked as they tried to reach loved ones. The internet failed, but Alaska Public Media never stopped broadcasting. Operating on backup power, they immediately activated their emergency protocols.
As the aftershocks, including a 5.7 tremor, continued to rock the region, APM provided real-time updates on road closures, school evacuations, and tsunami warnings. They broadcasted which bridges had been damaged, where emergency shelters had opened, most critically assured isolated communities that the help was on the way. For thousands of Alaskans, that familiar voice on radio was their only connection to vital information during the most terrifying memories that they have had. In a letter to the editor of the Anchorage Daily News, one person wrote:
So it is not just Alaska that has this problem. Consider what happened in Kentucky during the historic tornadoes in December of 2021, when the devastating EF4 tornado carved a 160-mile path of destruction on one of the longest tornado tracks in our Nation's history. WKMS Public Radio became the sole source of news for thousands of Kentuckians.
As the tornado ripped through Mayfield at 9:30, destroying the town's candle factory with 110 people stuck inside, commercial power failed across western Kentucky. And those cell towers toppled; the internet connections vanished. And WKMS kept broadcasting on a backup power, guiding search and rescue teams through darkness. It is time that my colleagues understand that, in the words of station managers, ``In these kinds of moments, your emergency radio or your car radio is literally the only thing to have to get you any news or a lifeline.''
I ask my colleagues, please do not cut off emergency broadcast funding. How could you possibly think that is a wise idea in the events that we are facing in our Nation?
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, we are here today. We are about to begin vote-arama--vote-arama. We seem to do this quite a bit these days, but we are here to do it on a very, very important bill: the rescissions package for President Trump.
I spoke yesterday--and I won't go on for as long as I did yesterday-- about what this is all about. What this bill is about is to test the will of this Chamber--if we can actually move forward on what the American people sent us here to do, which is to find waste, to find fraud, and to find abuse; and also to realign the taxpayer dollars that go out the door with actual American interests.
So we are going to have a lot of conversations about the foreign aid spending, and it has been certainly highlighted, as it should be--some of the ridiculousness and craziness.
And my friend from Hawaii is talking about: Well, that is not going to happen anymore.
Well, good, we don't need the money for it. But let's make sure it never happens again by sending a message that this Chamber can actually see what happened and course correct--$18 million to gender diversity in the Mexican street lighting industry, $2.4 million to make international disaster aid more considerate of sexual orientation and gender identity, $2.2 million to reduce xenophobia toward Venezuelan migrants, $3 million for Iraqi ``Sesame Street,'' and $33 million for U.N. programs like funding for transgender tampons in Bangladesh, LGBTQ campaigns in Rio, and third-gender community centers in Southeast Asia.
If you are listening to this, if you are watching this, that is offensive. That is just a short laundry list in the ways in which these bureaucrats have betrayed the trust of the American people.
So what is today about? It is our effort to try to restore not only just some fiscal sanity to this place, which everybody has talked about, even across the aisle--hopefully, maybe; I don't know--and not just that, but the political will to take that vote to go do it. Many, many legislators in many, many Senates over the generations have talked about doing this.
In fact, President Ronald Reagan talked about getting rid of Federal money for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in the early 1980s. It didn't happen. But guess what. Today, we can actually go do that.
We don't have to sit by anymore and continue to send the hard-earned tax dollars that are sent here by the guys that swing the hammer and the gals who drive the trucks back in Missouri, who should be mortified that they are spending money for the head of NPR to call the President a bigot, a racist; to look over the vast continent of our country and where I come from, ``Flyover Country,'' and look down on them and actually use our money for programming to tell them that, every single hour of every single day.
Enough and enough.
So that is the charge here today, Mr. President. Let the vote-arama begin.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 2 minutes of debate, equally divided, prior to each vote in relation to Calendar No. 114, H.R. 4.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SCHIMTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order for the following Senators to be recognized to offer amendments, motions, or points of order; that the amendments be reported by number, with no amendments in order prior to a vote in relation to the amendments or motions: No. 1, Coons No. 2856; No. 2, Cortez Masto motion to recommit regarding CPB impacting public safety; No. 3, Gallego motion to recommit re: CPB rural/Tribal; No. 4, Hirono motion to recommit re: CPB emergency alert system; and, No. 5, Baldwin No. 2855.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Delaware.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2856 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
The bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
(Purpose: To strike the rescission of amounts made available for
international disaster assistance, to ensure the United States can compete with China and maintain our long tradition of providing life-
Mr. President, it was Ronald Reagan who said America is great because America is good. My amendment would restore $496 million of international disaster relief funding by removing it from this rescissions package.
This money doesn't just save lives in countries around the world when they suffer earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, and natural disasters. It strengthens our standing, brings us closer to our allies, and helps us compete with China.
Two months ago, I visited the Philippines on a bipartisan codel and was struck to learn it is the most disaster-prone country on Earth. Today, they are giving us access to nine new military sites. They are one of our strongest treaty partners in the region.
And why? When I asked their leaders, they said because America helps respond to disasters.
Mr. President, $496 million, 0.01 percent of the debt Republicans have just added to our Nation in the last 2 weeks, and this money is implemented by Catholic Relief Services, World Vision, and the World Food Programme.
I ask my colleagues to support it.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to this amendment from Senator Coons that strikes the rescission for international disaster assistance, IDA. I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment.
Many foreign governments and U.N. agencies have become reliant on U.S. emergency funding, using it to avoid in investing in their own disaster preparedness.
IDA is intended to aid in response to emergencies around the world. But, instead, it has gone to things like $3 million for sexual reproductive health in Venezuela; $2.1 for climate resilience in Southeast Asia, Latin America, and East Africa; and $2.4 million to make aid more considerate of sexual orientation and gender identity.
IDA will still have unobligated funds--more than $6 billion--that the administration may use as they see fit.
Mr. President, with that, I urge my colleagues to vote no on amendment No. 2856.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of the amendment.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 49, nays 50, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2856) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant executive clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, I am introducing a motion to recommit stating that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting rescission cannot advance if it impacts public safety.
For years, public broadcasting has been essential to keeping Americans informed during severe weather and environment threats and broader public safety situations. Let me give you an example from my home State. As the Davis wildfire raged in Northern Nevada last summer, the local CBS affiliate lost their transmitter in the fire. But thanks to public broadcasting services, CBS was able to air their local newscast and keep Nevadans informed about evacuations, the path of the fire, and safety measures.
Public broadcasting stations also work with law enforcement to get information out related to abducted children, missing seniors, and major acts of violence.
Now is not the time to claw back funding that this body has already approved for public broadcasting's emergency alert system. I urge my colleagues who care about keeping America safe to support this motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the amendment offered from my colleague Senator Cortez Masto.
Let's be clear about this. The funding rescinded in this package has zero--zero--impact on emergency alert systems. The Integrated Public Alert and Warning System, IPAWS, or Next Generation Warning System Grant Program are funded and operated by FEMA, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Those alerts do not rely on CPB, and they certainly don't depend on taxpayer subsidies for partisan media outlets. Any entity could administer these programs without funneling money through a politically biased intermediary. If adopted, this motion would kill the bill by delaying its consideration by the July deadline and stand in the way of Republican efforts to eliminate wasteful spending and deliver on the President's agenda for the American people. I urge my colleagues to vote no.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
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.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion is as follows:
Mr. President, cutting funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting would devastate local public media, especially rural and Tribal areas where CPB funds make up the majority of their budgets.
In Arizona, stations like Whiteriver and Tuba City rely on CPB for about three-quarters of their funding. That is
At the same time Republicans are proposing these cuts, they are handing out tax breaks for billionaires and other corporations. They are sending a clear message that Tribal and rural communities matter less than the filthy rich that do not need more and more tax cuts. That is why I move to limit the damage of cutting funds for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and to protect stations in rural and Tribal communities.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in strong opposition to the amendment offered by Senator Gallego.
The overwhelming majority of CPB's funding goes to NPR and PBS-- entities that have drifted far from their original mission and now serve as megaphones for partisan, leftwing activism. American taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize programming that glorifies radical gender ideology in schools or pushes to defund the police.
Local stations are not without resources. They already receive revenue from individual donations, membership drives, corporate sponsorships, and private grants. On top of that, many States already invest in public broadcasting. It is entirely reasonable and, frankly, long overdue to expect they just shoulder more of the burden here.
This amendment is not about protecting rural radio stations or television stations; it is about protecting a political agenda with taxpayer dollars.
If adopted, this motion would kill the bill by delaying its consideration by the July 18 deadline and stand in the way of Republican efforts to eliminate wasteful spending and deliver on the President's agenda to the American people.
I urge my colleagues to vote no.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, public broadcasters are essential to rural communities, often serving as the only emergency alert system when disasters or emergencies occur. These alerts can mean the difference between life or death.
Public broadcasters around the country, especially those in rural communities, rely on significant funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is why Congress has consistently provided CPB funding on a bipartisan basis.
By cutting funding from public broadcasting, this bill will jeopardize public broadcasters and the lifesaving service they provide. My motion to recommit will ensure that no public broadcasting station that participates in the emergency alert system would lose funding as a result of this bill.
As natural disasters increase in frequency across our country, this motion will help protect our communities and ensure they can get timely, lifesaving information--
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Time has expired.
--when disasters strike. I urge my colleagues to vote yes on this motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by the Senator from Hawaii, Senator Hirono. Saying that defunding CPB will somehow prevent Americans from receiving emergency alerts is demonstrably not only fearmongering but not true.
Emergency alerts, the kind you see on your cell phone and that air on TV and radio stations, are sent out via a system funded and operated by FEMA, called the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System, or IPAWS. If we rescind CBP's annual funding, IPAWS will continue to operate as usual, sending emergency alerts to cell phones, public broadcasters, and commercial broadcasters alike. Simply put, we don't need to subsidize leftwing propaganda in order to keep Americans safe.
If adopted, this motion will kill the bill by delaying its consideration by the July 18 deadline and stand in the way of Republican efforts to provide accountability and course-correct from wasteful spending and deliver on President Trump's agenda for the American people.
I urge my colleagues to vote no.
This bill endangers the public.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
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.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order for the following Senators to be recognized to offer amendments, motions, or points of order; that the amendments be reported by number, with no amendments in order prior to a vote in relation to the amendments or motions: No. 1, Warner, motion to recommit regarding Economic Support Fund; No. 2, Schumer, motion to recommit regarding countering China; No. 3, Schiff, amendment No. 2862; No. 4, Markey, motion to recommit regarding children's educational programs; and, No. 5, Rosen amendment No. 2878.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. President, I call up the Baldwin, Murkowski, Cantwell amendment No. 2855 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. President, our amendment would strike the rescission for Public Broadcasting. Eliminating this funding would be devastating for local public radio and television stations. It would reduce or eliminate access to educational programming, local news, and lifesaving alerts during emergencies and natural disasters. It would disproportionately harm our rural and Tribal communities.
If my colleagues have concerns about this funding, I commit to working with you on those concerns as part of the appropriations process. That is where we should have these debates. But these issues were not even raised as a part of our appropriations process during the past 2 years. So to take this extraordinary step and say that these issues are now so grave and so urgent that we have to address them like this, what are we doing here?
If we don't adopt this amendment, local television and radio stations will shut down, and it will be rural stations that will be the first to close.
I urge my colleagues to vote for our bipartisan amendment and to work with me on these issues as part of the appropriations process, where they should be dealt with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
Mr. President, public broadcasting has long been overtaken by partisan activists, plain and simple. This isn't just an abstract critique.
NPR and PBS have revealed their leftwing bias time and time again. When blowing the whistle on NPR, Uri Berliner, a former senior editor-- himself a leftwing Democrat--wrote that ``NPR has always had a liberal bent. . . . An opened-minded spirit no longer exists within NPR . . . we don't have an audience that reflects America.
Exhibit A: After the New York Post broke the Hunter Biden laptop story, NPR ran political cover for the Democrats, refusing to cover the story.
Mind you, the story was true; that is why they didn't want to cover it.
As for PBS, its coverage of last year's DNC was only 12 percent negative; the RNC, a staggering 72 percent negative.
If you want to watch leftwing propaganda, turn on MSNBC, but the taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize it.
I urge a ``no'' vote on this amendment.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of the amendment.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 52, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2855) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The bill clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, I rise today--I know many of us have--with deep concern about the administration shuttering USAID, firing thousands of State Department personnel, and retreating from America's place in the world. These actions threaten our national security and our economic interests.
Africa has the world's fastest growing population, projected to be home for 25 percent of the global population by 2050 and has enormous reserves and strategic benefits.
I can tell you, back in Virginia we benefit greatly from the vibrant and diverse African diaspora populations.
Our adversaries get this, too, and China has been jumping at the opportunity to make inroads as we retreat from Africa.
This administration's haphazard retreat from our commitments in Africa make us all less safe. Rescinding these economic support and development funds is harmful today, but it is, in the long run, a clear and avoidable catastrophe, one that mortgages our strategic interests, our credibility, and our security.
I urge my colleagues to support my motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the motion to recommit offered by Senator Warner that would effectively kill this bill. Let me be clear, the funding we are rescinding in this package will have no bearing on the safety, security, or prosperity of the American people. So much of our money for too long has been misaligned with any idea of a core American interest. This bill seeks to rectify that.
Rather, the economic support funding we are rescinding has been used to do things like support sedentary migrants in Colombia, hold a pride parade in foreign countries, to teach children how to make environmentally friendly reproductive health decisions overseas.
It is long past time to recoup the funds for asinine programs like these and work to regain the trust of the American people once again. As I mentioned, if adopted, this motion would kill the bill by delaying its consideration until after the July 18 deadline and stand in the way of our efforts to eliminate waste and spending and deliver on President Trump's agenda for the American people.
I urge my colleagues to vote no.
Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to recommit.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion.
The senior assistant executive clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, Donald Trump and Republicans always like to talk a big game when it comes to adversaries like the Chinese Government. But the bill they are pushing, which slashes vital foreign aid, would be a gift to President Xi and to Vladimir Putin.
My amendment is simple. It stops Republicans from cutting funds to outcompete the Chinese Government, it helps us beat the Chinese Government in the race for precious critical minerals, and it fights back against the Chinese Government's cyber attacks and influence campaigns. It will also stop Republicans from defunding our partners in the Indo-Pacific, often the first line of defense against Chinese Government encroachment.
You cannot support this rescissions package and be serious about wanting to outcompete the Chinese Government at every opportunity. Right now, for instance, the United States and the CCP are racing for access to critical minerals that power the most important technologies. U.S. development programs are critical for accessing these materials, but Senate Republicans want to ax these vital funds and, thereby, hand the keys over to Beijing.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
I say to my colleagues: Let's not hand over American leadership to the Chinese Communist Party just to pay for more tax breaks for billionaires.
Vote yes on my amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by Senator Schumer.
We heard that refrain before the Big Beautiful Bill--the tired refrain about tax breaks for billionaires. The Democrats don't have anything left and are resorting to these sorts of amendments, which, by the way, are already covered in the substitute.
Let's be clear, funding rescinded in this package has no bearing on the safety, security, and prosperity of the American people. It will only make us more focused on the threat of communist China.
No more ridiculous spending. Let's get focused on our chief adversary, which is China. In fact, the substitute, as I mentioned, already protects the foreign aid fund for countering China's malign influence by protecting the Countering PRC Influence Fund.
Contrary to my colleague's assertions, I suspect communist China loves to see America squander its resources on shoving radical leftwing social programs on societies around the globe.
If adopted, this motion would kill the bill by delaying consideration until after July 18 and stand in the way of our efforts to return accountability and have this Chamber actually speak, as it should, that we are going to reduce wasteful spending, once and for all, and deliver on President Trump's important agenda for the American people.
I urge my colleagues to vote no.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
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.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 52, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2862 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
The assistant bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
Mr. President, my Republican colleagues have offered a substitute amendment that claims to prohibit cuts for programs dealing with HIV, tuberculosis, malaria, as well as nutrition and maternal health support, but the total amount of money they are rescinding is unchanged, putting all of those efforts at risk.
If this sounds familiar, it is a lot like a reconciliation process that demands a trillion dollars in cuts but says that Medicaid should not be touched. And we know what happened there: Medicaid was cut massively.
Several Republicans have pointed out that we don't know how the administration is going to implement this bill. That is a major problem.
So let's make this as simple as possible. The Senate doesn't want to cut funding for AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, and other diseases? Then let's remove those rescissions. My amendment would reduce the amount of cuts to global health programs in order to ensure that funding for HIV, tuberculosis, malaria, and maternal health and nutrition programs remain, not just in theory but in real dollars and cents.
I urge a ``yes'' vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to this amendment from Senator Schiff that reduces the global health rescission from $500 million to $66 million to fence off unobligated balances for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, and other diseases.
We already do that in the substitute. What we are also doing in the substitute, though, I would point out, is targeting egregious waste like $7.4 million for a curriculum that teaches practitioners about environmental racism and DEI. Remember, that $7.4 million could have been used to save lives. By slashing the amount rescinded from the global health funding, we would be allowing this inexcusable use of taxpayer dollars to continue.
With that, I urge my colleagues to vote no on amendment No. 2862.
Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of the amendment.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk called the roll.
The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. Paul).
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) and the Senator from Virginia (Mr. Warner) are necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 46, nays 51, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2862) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The bill clerk read as follows:
Mr. President, I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, my motion would ensure that this Republican bill will not cut access to children's educational programming through public television stations. From 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. every single day, the public television system is the children's television network for free in our country. Hour after hour, public television delivers free, entertaining, educational programming for all children, all ages, Black, White, Latino, Asian, for free, regardless of race, regardless of income. And its ``Arthur,'' ``Molly of Denali,'' the ``Wild Kratts,'' ``Lyla in the Loop,'' ``Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood,'' on all day long.
These Republican bill cuts will cause stations that deliver this essential children's programming to go dark. These cuts will be especially devastating to millions of children and families in rural and underserved and low-income communities that don't have access to a high-speed network. Defunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is a betrayal of all those kids.
The Markey motion says--and I ask for an ``aye''--keep the children's television network on PBS on all day all across our country for free, for every child. That has educated generations of children in our country. Keep the children's television network on the air. Vote aye for the Markey motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I stand in opposition to the amendment from Senator Markey. Saying that defunding the CPB will somehow prevent Americans from receiving children's educational programming is patently false. American taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize programming that glorifies radical gender ideology at schools or encourages children to defund the police.
As just one example, PBS programming has been used to help fund a children's learning segment promoting the book ``The Hips on the Drag Queen Go Swish, Swish, Swish.'' This is not any sane person's definition of an appropriate use of taxpayer dollars.
Eliminating this funding doesn't ban public stations from airing kids' programming; it just ends the Federal subsidy. Taxpayers across this country should not be funding that nonsense.
This motion isn't about protecting children's education; it is about protecting a political agenda with taxpayer dollars.
I urge my colleagues to vote no.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
I request the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from West Virginia (Mrs. Capito).
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Klobuchar) and the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) are necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 50, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order for the following Senators to be recognized to offer amendments, motions, or points of order; that the amendments be reported by number, with no amendments in order prior to a vote in relation to the amendments or motions: No. 1, Senator Kaine, motion to recommit regarding faith-based organizations; No. 2, Senator Booker, amendment No. 2887.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Nevada.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2878, and I ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant executive clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
(Purpose: To strike the rescission of funds appropriated for Global
Health programs, including family planning and reproductive health)
Mr. President, I rise today to speak on behalf of global health.
Global health programs save lives; they grow economies; they create more stable societies. But this cruel bill eliminates $500 million in global health funding that would gut family planning programs. That means that 47 million women and couples could lose access to essential care around the globe and that tens of thousands of women will die as a result. When women have the right to decide when and how many children to have, they succeed; families succeed. This means we spend less, not more, in foreign assistance.
My amendment makes sure women have the ability to make decisions about their own bodies, their lives, and their futures. We will all be better for it. I urge my colleagues to support the Rosen amendment.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
Mr. President, I object to the Senator's motion to strike the provision that protects taxpayer dollars from funding foreign abortion programs through the global health program. The American people agree with me, and I have got a poll right here: 73 percent of Americans oppose or strongly oppose using their tax dollars to support abortion services in other countries.
While the substitute amendment protects critical lifesaving initiatives in the global health account, including maternal and child healthcare, there is absolutely zero, nada, naught--no reason--that taxpayers should be funding abortion programs abroad. We are $37 trillion in debt. The American people are demanding fiscal responsibility, and they do not want their hard-earned tax dollars funding a far-left agenda that violates their closely held beliefs, especially when it comes to protecting the dignity of human life.
I urge a ``no'' vote on this amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on adoption of the amendment.
Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
If my Republican colleagues were so worried about the debt, they wouldn't have added $3 trillion to the reconciliation.
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.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2878) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion to recommit.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit is as follows:
Mr. President, my motion would require the bill to come back with no cuts to faith-based organizations in the International Development account and the Migration and Refugee Assistance accounts. These two accounts, on the refugee side, provide service to lawful immigrants of the United States overwhelmingly by faith-based organizations in this country, and the development assistance is disaster relief by faith-based organizations.
Whose funds are being cut by this? Catholic Relief Services--been doing this for 80 years; Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society; World Vision; World Relief Corporation of the Evangelical Association; Lutheran Social Services; Lutheran World Relief; the Episcopal Church; Bethany Christian Services; Jesuit Refugee Services; Samaritans First.
This is a war on faith-based workers who are providing services in many instances for decades, even over a century. I would ask the support of my colleagues that we not cut faith-based organizations doing work in accordance with their faith.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. President, I do rise to be able to speak in opposition to this motion to recommit. It would kill the entire bill. I understand that is the intent of it, and I can appreciate that.
The Senator from Virginia is my friend, and the list that he listed off of faith-based organizations I strongly support, and so does he.
This particular section that is being reduced is being reduced about 25 percent of the total amount. So I can speak with great confidence. This is not cutting off all those faith-based entities. What this is doing is adjusting for the dramatic shift that has happened on our southern border. Much of the refugee work that has been done has been assisting refugees moving through Central and South America and Mexico into the United States.
A year and a half ago, we had a quarter million people a month that were illegally crossing our border, asking for asylum at our border. Now we have, many days, less than 200 even attempt. The need has dramatically dropped from what it was 18 months ago. This adjusts that account by 25 percent. It does not eliminate faith-based organizations.
There are great needs around the world, and I am incredibly grateful to the faith-based organizations that do remarkable work that partner with our government.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. President, I just ask that you join with these organizations that support my motion, and I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
Mr. President, I would like to call up my amendment No. 2887 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
the Future Program to improve global food security and agricultural resiliency and support agriculture research that benefits United States
Mr. President, I have had the real pleasure, over the last 14 years, to work on some great bipartisan projects. Probably, my favorite is the Feed the Future Program.
The chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee says he is proud of the Feed the Future Program because it helps to save lives, promotes self-reliance, and opens up new trade opportunities.
Numerous of my colleagues know this is one of the programs that does extraordinary things. For example, for every $1 the U.S. Government spends on Feed the Future, it unlocks $6 of private investment.
The program has shown to expand and diversify export markets that are critical to farmers and agribusinesses, and these programs lessen the reliance on humanitarian aid and strengthen local communities.
It is one of the most intelligent investments we do, and it deals with 735 million people around the world who are facing hunger.
This program has wide bipartisan support in this body, and my amendment simply says that we will reduce the development assistance funding in this rescission by $785 million to restore this widely bipartisan-supported program.
Mr. President, you are struggling to find that button.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Your time has expired.
I know my time has expired, and I am grateful for the indulgence. Thank you.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to this amendment from
The rescissions package already protects essential food security programs, including the Feed the Future Innovation Labs and administration of the Food for Peace and the McGovern-Dole Programs, all of which serve core American value interests.
It also leaves billions in unobligated balances under the development assistance, under the economic support fund and international disaster assistance accounts--all available to support the types of agriculture- led growth that make Americans safer, stronger, and more prosperous.
But these aren't the programs my friend from New Jersey is trying to protect. Instead of enabling us to support our most effective programs, it would enable the ineffective ones that Democrats love to champion.
With that, I urge a ``no'' vote on amendment 2887.
Mr. President, before I ask for the yeas and nays, I just want to say, despite what my colleague said, he is welcome to New Jersey anytime. I still love him.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of amendment No. 2887.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2887) was rejected.
(Mr. CURTIS assumed the Chair.)
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order for the following Senators to be recognized to offer amendments, motions, or points of order; that the amendments be reported by number with no amendments in order prior to a vote in relation to the amendments or motions: Kelly, No. 2893; and Murkowski, No. 2865.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2893 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
The bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
Mr. President, this whole thing is a bad deal for the American people. It is a gut punch to rural communities and makes us weaker and less safe on the world stage.
This amendment, though, dials back the worst of some of these cuts, especially for public broadcasting that is so important to so many Americans.
Now, this amendment was drafted by Senator Collins, and I understand she isn't planning to offer it. But I think it is worth seeing if a bipartisan majority of us can come together to support it. And this is a good amendment and it will protect important elements of our public broadcast funding and it will preserve the vital funding for Ukraine, NATO, and other items that have bipartisan support that otherwise would be cut in the Republican rescissions package.
Now, let's be clear, Senate Democrats oppose this rescissions package. But we are giving our colleagues yet another opportunity to make it less harmful as they claim they were willing to do. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to vote yes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
Mr. President, I don't know if it is without precedence, but it is certainly unusual when the author of the amendment decides not to offer the amendment and somebody else will take that amendment and offer it. So I would move to table this amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from New York (Mrs. Gillibrand), and the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) are necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 51, nays 47, as follows:
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be the final amendments in order; that the amendments be reported by number; that following disposition of the amendments, the bill, as amended, if amended, be read a third time, and the Senate vote on passage of Calendar No. 114, H.R. 4, as amended, if amended, with no intervening action or debate; and finally, that if passed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table: No. 1, Shaheen amendment No. 2898; No. 2, Ossoff amendment No. 2896; No. 3, Merkley amendment No. 2863; No. 4, Kim motion to recommit; No. 5, Lujan motion to recommit; and, No. 6, Schmitt amendment No. 2853, the substitute.
Mr. President, I also ask for unanimous consent that all remaining votes be 10 minutes in length.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
I would ask that Senators please stay in their seats.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.
I call up my amendment No. 2865.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
The bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
Mr. President, I have a news alert. This afternoon, we had a 7.3 earthquake off of the coast of Alaska. Pretty big.
We got the alert from KUCB staff members who felt this earthquake out there in Alaska. They contacted the emergency responders. It was an all-hands-on-deck. I am looking at a text I received from the station manager there at KUCB: Three staff members worked at sea level in our studio to get emergency messages on the air in coordination with local public safety officials. A fourth employee worked remotely to update the web and social media. When the tsunami sirens started to glare, the voice message in the warning instructed community members to tune into the local radio. We provided up-to-date information throughout the entire evacuation and all-clear procedures.
So the good news is, tsunami is all clear. They say this is the work we do to keep Alaska safe, and it is only possible with Federal funding.
Mr. President, I have an amendment that protects public media, their independence, their ability to provide local news, weather reports, and, yes, emergency alerts. What we do in this amendment is we tweak the rescission for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to protect public broadcasting while removing the pot of money that can go directly to NPR.
We are reminded today that this stuff matters. I would hope my colleagues would recognize what is at stake and vote for my amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in objection to the amendment from my colleague from Alaska.
As was mentioned earlier on several of these other Corporation for Public Broadcasting amendments, this rescission does nothing to affect FEMA, which actually does the emergency response system.
Our hearts--and I know this is a scary situation in Alaska. The good news is FEMA has money for these sorts of alerts.
We have come a long way tonight. We are almost there. Our efforts to finally prevent Federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting--this is maybe one of the last votes for that. What is important to note here is this would gut that aspect of it. And 93 percent of the work that we are trying to do would be eliminated here. This would effectively fully fund the Corporation of Public Broadcasting to the tune of 93 percent of what we are currently trying to rescind. This is a very important vote. I would ask my colleagues to vote no.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on adoption of the amendment.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from New York (Mrs. Gillibrand) and the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) are necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 51, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2865) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2898, and I ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
Mr. President, I rise to propose an amendment to strike the rescission of funds to Ukraine.
With Russian attacks intensifying against Ukraine, now is not the time to cut funds that have rebuilt Ukraine's energy grid, sustained Ukraine's ability to export agricultural goods, and supported efforts to keep the Ukrainian Government accountable to its anti-corruption commitments and reform efforts.
Given the President's support for increasing weapons to Ukraine and for trying to put pressure on Russia, this is an important amendment because it would preserve that assistance to Ukraine, keeping its energy grid online, preventing the collapse of its economy, and preserving Ukraine's Western economic orientation.
I urge my colleagues to support this amendment. We do not want the Ukrainian army and their technological know-how in the orbit of Russia. We want it in Europe and the United States.
This amendment also has the support of Senators Murkowski and Durbin.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina.
Mr. President, No. 1, I want to applaud Senator Shaheen for all she has done for Ukraine. And, quite frankly, to all of my Democratic colleagues and Republican colleagues, I think we are trying to do right by Ukraine.
So what is right by Ukraine?
We have given well over $100 billion in aid and military assistance. And what are we trying to do here? We are not rescinding the $4 billion that is
What we are doing is rescinding an account of $460 million that has a bunch of things in it, including $300,000 for promoting tourism in the Caucasus; $832,000 to fund social media mentorship in Serbia and Belarus; and $5 million for green transportation and logistics.
I want to help Ukraine, and the best thing we can do to help Ukraine right now is what President Trump is doing. Having the Europeans buy our weapons to give to Ukraine, I think, is good for the American economy, the American taxpayer, and for the Ukrainian military.
But the best thing we could do is what we are doing, and I want to applaud everybody who has joined in with Senator Blumenthal and myself. It is to break China, India, and Brazil from buying Russian oil to prop up Putin's war machine.
If you want to help Ukraine, crush Putin's customers who buy his oil and gas. There are 85 of us who have come together and said to Russia, China, and Brazil--
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
--if you keep buying his cheap oil, which is blood money, we are going to crush your economy.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
That is the best way to help Ukraine.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
The question now is on adoption of the amendment.
Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 49, nays 50, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2898) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2853 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
Mr. President, many of us in the Senate are parents or grandparents of young children.
This is Abdullah. He was a 1-year-old, starving in a war zone in Yemen until his life was saved by emergency rations sent by the American people through UNICEF.
This bill ends the entire direct American contribution to UNICEF. Are we so calloused by politics that we would make this grievous and avoidable error, moral error? Do we believe it is the will of our constituents that children like Abdullah should die?
We are U.S. Senators with the power through this vote to save children's lives and to spare their parents the heartbreak of a small child's death. Vote aye.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the amendment from Senator Ossoff.
UNICEF's mission, although admirable, is not immune from waste, fraud, and abuse. That is why this rescission package includes $142 million for UNICEF's overhead.
The truth of the matter is, there is still significant funds for lifesaving care for kids, even after this rescission package is adopted. And my substitute amendment protects maternal and child health in the Global Health account.
With that, I urge the body to vote no on this amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The time has expired.
The question is on adoption of the amendment.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2896) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2863 and ask that it be reported by number.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
The assistant bill clerk read as follows:
The amendment is as follows:
that had been appropriated for the United States Institute of Peace)
Colleagues, a bipartisan story: In 1984, four Senators came together to reduce the risk of war. All four were veterans of World War II: two Republicans--Mark Hatfield, a Navy lieutenant, and Ted Stevens, Army Air Corps pilot; and two Democrats--John Glenn, a Navy fighter pilot, and Sparky Matsunaga with the 100th Infantry Battalion.
They knew the horror of war, and they resolved to ensure that conflict resolution and diplomacy would always be tools available to reduce the risk of war; to resolve world challenges; to reduce the risk of American servicemen and servicewomen dying in such wars. So they created the U.S. Institute of Peace. It was signed into law by President Reagan.
Marine Major General Zinni testified to the effectiveness--often unseen, often behind the scenes--of their work in Asia, in the Balkans, in Africa, and in the Middle East.
Tonight, let's channel that bipartisan support for reducing the risk of war, saving the lives of our service men and women, and sustain funding for the Institute of Peace.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by Senator Merkley.
The Trump administration has been very clear and has directed that the nonstatutory components and functions of the U.S. Institute of Peace shall be eliminated to remain consistent with applicable law.
The Institute of Peace, although it has a great sounding name, has violated this order and gone well beyond their statutory authority on a number of fronts--and I will just mention one of them--including funding projects at the University of Denver for escaping the ethnic trap of deeply divided societies. The list could go on and on. We don't have the time to do it.
But this Agency has exceeded its mandate and has become nothing more--at this point or in many ways--than a think tank that peddles radical left ideology, violated the trust of the American people.
Part of our charge tonight is to help restore that trust. And with that charge in mind, I urge my colleagues to vote no on this amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of the amendment.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Mr. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 48, nays 51, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2863) was rejected.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion.
The senior assistant executive clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, public broadcasting has educated and informed and inspired generations, teaching important lessons to people of all ages and sharing powerful stories, including of our Nation's veterans.
One story at a time--the StoryCorps Military Voices Initiative uplifts the humanity and possibility in all of us. Each week on NPR, they share stories to over 12 million listeners.
Then there is the PBS program ``Veterans Coming Home'' focused on sharing the experiences of veterans as they enter civilian life.
The American Homefront Project breaks down challenges facing our troops, making sure we have conversations about what support military personnel and veterans need from all of us.
The stories of our heroes aren't partisan; they aren't political. These are trusted, nonpartisan, powerful initiatives sharing the real experiences of our veterans, their families, and our communities, and reminding the rest of us of the price of freedom.
Yet this rescission package before us threatens to eliminate over $1 billion in funding for public broadcasting, including these programs.
That is why I move to recommit this bill and bring it back without these senseless cuts. We can't let veterans' stories--the voices of those who have sacrificed for our country--be erased.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the motion that has been made by Senator Kim.
Two quick points. The first is, if this were to actually somehow pass, it would kill the bill because it would go beyond the July 18 deadline. Secondly, saying that defunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting can somehow prevent Americans from receiving veterans' educational programming is patently false.
Eliminating CBP doesn't do that. It doesn't ban public stations from airing this kind of program. Of course they can. But what is true is that American taxpayers are tired of having to subsidize radical leftist programming they hear every single day and every single week of every single month or watch every single day or every single week of every single month on NPR or PBS.
Mr. President, I urge my colleagues to vote no on this motion.
Mr. President, I will accept a voice vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. President, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
I ask that further reading be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The motion to recommit with instructions is as follows:
Mr. President, my motion is simple: Public broadcasting infrastructure funding should not be rescinded if it limits access to emergency alert systems and lifesaving weather updates.
Just last week, devastating floods across New Mexico claimed the lives of three people, including two children. Local radio was on the air issuing real-time warnings and helping people get to safety.
Despite these horrible tragedies in New Mexico, Texas, and the Northeast, my Republican colleagues are prepared to gut public broadcasting funding.
Public radio stations and local media are lifelines, especially in rural and Tribal communities. They don't just play music or share stories; they deliver emergency alerts and evacuation notices and lifesaving updates when disaster strikes.
It is not just weather. These systems broadcast AMBER Alerts when children go missing--alerts where every second counts. Delays costs lives.
Whether it is a flood, a fire, or a missing child, communities rely on these alerts to stay safe. Without funding and infrastructure, stations will collapse.
One New Mexico broadcaster put it plainly.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
Mr. President, if you give me a little more time, I will offer a voice vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, a New Mexico broadcaster put it plainly:
I urge my colleagues to vote yea, and I ask for a voice vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. President, this amendment reflects what Senate Republicans landed on after a long discussion 2 days ago, zeroing out every penny of Federal support for local radio and TV stations our constituents rely on, ripping away investments in emergency alerts, gutting lifesaving aid, and making steep cuts to foreign policy investments we have made on a bipartisan basis.
You might ask: What are those cuts? And even some of my Republican colleagues have said: We don't know because this administration will not tell us. So while this amendment makes one small trim, it seeks to protect just a handful of priorities without actually reducing any of the overall cuts.
The reality is, Republicans are planning to rubberstamp President Trump's request.
It is our communities, our reputation, our interest around the globe that will suffer the consequences. I will be voting no on this amendment and on final passage. I encourage my colleagues to do the same.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, we are on the precipice in this Chamber right now to do something that is rarely done in this town, which is to identify waste, fraud, and abuse and actually do something about it.
This is a rare thing. It is an important thing. It is about the $9 billion we are going to save or $90 billion in the 10-year window. And where I come from, that is still a lot of money. That is a lot of money. But it is more than just that. It is about restoring trust with the American people.
When the American people see dollars going to DEI trainings in Burma or sex changes in Guatemala, they wonder what in the world is going on around here.
Tonight, we can say: We hear you; we know why you sent us here; and we are going to do something about it.
With that, I urge my colleagues to vote yes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on adoption of the amendment.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Ms. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 52, nays 47, as follows:
The amendment (No. 2853), in the nature of a substitute, was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
Mr. President, this is a dark day for America, a dark day for rural Americans, a dark day for any American who relies on public broadcasting during floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, and other disasters, and this is also a dark day for this Chamber. Everyone here knows this is not how the Senate should function.
I urge my colleagues to vote no.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority Leader.
Mr. President, I want to thank Senator Schmitt for doing an exceptional job of managing this.
And also simply point out that our country is $36 trillion in debt. We can't keep doing the things the way--$36 trillion in debt. We can't keep doing things the way we have been doing them.
Ladies and gentlemen, what we are talking about here is one-tenth of 1 percent of all Federal spending--one-tenth of 1 percent of all Federal spending. But it is a step in the right direction, and it is the first time we have done anything like this in 35 years.
So I hope our colleagues will vote yes and support this legislation that is going to start moving us in a different direction, that gets us on a more fiscally sustainable path for the future of our country.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will read the title of the bill for the third time.
The amendment was ordered to be engrossed and the bill to be read a third time.
The bill was read the third time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The bill having been read the third time, the question is, Shall the bill, as amended, pass?
I ask for the yeas and nays.
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.
I announce that the Senator from Minnesota (Mr. Smith) is necessarily absent.
The result was announced--yeas 51, nays 48, as follows:
The bill (H.R. 4), as amended, was passed.
