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12Senate Resolution 494: Observing the 50th Anniversary of the Date on Which the Ss Edmund Fitzgerald Sank in Lake Superior, and Remembering the 29 Lives Lost in One of the Worst Storms Ever Recorded...
13Senate Resolution 495: Recognizing the 50th Anniversary of the End of the Vietnam War and Honoring the United States Veterans Who Served During the Conflict
15Senate Resolution 497: Permitting the Collection of Clothing, Toys, Food, and Housewares During the Holiday Season for Charitable Purposes in Senate Buildings
Six bills and seven resolutions were introduced, as follows: S. 3169-3174, and S. Res. 492-498.
Page S8132
Measures Passed
Continuing Appropriations, Agriculture, Legislative Branch, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Extensions Act: By 60 yeas to 40 nays (Vote No. 618), Senate passed H.R. 5371, making continuing appropriations and extensions for fiscal year 2026, after agreeing to the motion to proceed, and after taking action on the following amendments and motions proposed thereto:
Pages S8113-22, S8125-31
Adopted
By 60 yeas to 40 nays (Vote No. 616), Thune (for Collins) Amendment No. 3937, in the nature of a substitute.
Pages S8125, S8129-30
Rejected
Thune (for Paul) Amendment No. 3941 (to Amendment No. 3937), to strike a provision modifying the definition of hemp for purposes of the Agriculture Marketing Act of 1946. (By 76 yeas to 24 nays (Vote No. 614), Senate tabled the amendment.)
Pages S8125, S8128-29
Withdrawn
Thune Amendment No. 3943 (to the language proposed to be stricken by Amendment No. 3937), to change the enactment date.
Page S8125
During consideration of this measure today, Senate also took the following action
By 60 yeas to 40 nays (Vote No. 611), Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to consideration of the bill.
Pages S8124-25
Thune Amendment No. 3942 (to Amendment No. 3941), to change the enactment date, fell when Thune (for Paul) Amendment No. 3941 (to Amendment No. 3937) (listed above) was tabled.
Page S8125
By 60 yeas to 40 nays (Vote No. 615), three-fifths of those Senators duly chosen and sworn, having voted in the affirmative, Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on Thune (for Collins) Amendment No. 3937 (listed above).
Page S8129
Thune motion to commit the bill to the Committee on Appropriations, with instructions, Thune Amendment No. 3945, to change the enactment date, fell when cloture was invoked on Thune (for Collins) Amendment No. 3937 (listed above).
Page S8125
Thune Amendment No. 3946 (to (the instructions) Amendment No. 3945), the change the enactment date, fell when Thune motion to commit the bill to the Committee on Appropriations, with instructions, Thune Amendment No. 3945 (listed above) fell.
Page S8125
Thune Amendment No. 3947 (to Amendment No. 3946), to change the enactment date, fell when Thune Amendment No. 3946 (to (the instructions) Amendment No. 3945) (listed above) fell. (By 47 yeas to 53 nays (Vote No. 612), Senate earlier failed to table the amendment.) (By 47 yeas to 53 nays (Vote No. 613), Senate earlier failed to table the amendment.)
Pages S8125-28
Thune Amendment No. 3944 (to Amendment No. 3943), the change the enactment date, fell when Thune Amendment No. 3943 (to the language proposed to be stricken by Amendment No. 3937) (listed above) was withdrawn.
Page S8125
By 60 yeas to 40 nays (Vote No. 617), three-fifths of those Senators duly chosen and sworn, having voted in the affirmative, Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the bill.
Page S8130
Permitting Collections for Charitable Purposes
Senate agreed to S. Res. 497, permitting the collection of clothing, toys, food, and housewares during the holiday season for charitable purposes in Senate buildings.
Page S8183
50th Anniversary of the Sinking of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald
Senate agreed to S. Res. 494, observing the 50th anniversary of the date on which the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank in Lake Superior, and remembering the 29 lives lost in one of the worst storms ever recorded on the Great Lakes.
Page S8183
50th Anniversary of the End of the Vietnam War
Senate agreed to S. Res. 495, recognizing the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War and honoring the United States veterans who served during the conflict.
Page S8183
National First-Generation College Celebration Day
Senate agreed to S. Res. 496, expressing support for the designation of November 8, 2025, as ``National First-Generation College Celebration Day''. Honoring Dr.
Page S8183
Jane Goodall
Senate agreed to S. Res. 498, honoring Dr. Jane Goodall and her legacy as an ethologist, conservationist, and activist.
Page S8183
Signing Authority: Agreement
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that all members of the Republican Conference be authorized to sign duly enrolled bills or joint resolutions from November 11, through November 18, 2025.
Page S8183
Pro Forma Sessions: Agreement
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that the Senate convene for pro forma sessions, with no business being conducted on the following dates and times: Thursday, November 13, 2025, at 6:30 p.m.; and Monday, November 17, 2025, at 3 p.m.; and that when the Senate adjourns on Monday, November 17, 2025, it next convene at 3 p.m., on Tuesday, November 18, 2025.
Page S8183
Nieh Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Ho Nieh, of Alabama, to be a Member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the remainder of the term expiring June 30, 2029.
Page S8131
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, and pursuant to the unanimous-consent agreement of Monday, November 10, 2025, a vote on cloture will occur at 5:30 p.m., on Tuesday, November 18, 2025.
Page S8183
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S8131
Korb Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Donald Korb, of Ohio, to be Chief Counsel for the Internal Revenue Service and an Assistant General Counsel in the Department of the Treasury.
Page S8131
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of Ho Nieh, of Alabama, to be a Member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the remainder of the term expiring June 30, 2029.
Page S8131
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session.
Page S8131
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S8131
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing that notwithstanding Rule XXII, the cloture motions filed on Monday, November 10, 2025, ripen at 5:30 p.m., on Tuesday, November 18, 2025.
Page S8183
Statements on Introduced Bills/Resolutions:
Pages S8133-36
Record Votes
Eight record votes were taken today. (Total--618)
Pages S8124-25, S8127-30
Adjournment
Senate convened at 11 a.m. and adjourned at 9:46 p.m., until 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, November 13, 2025. (For Senate's program, see the remarks of the Majority Leader in today's Record on page S8183.)
Every speech and line is the Congressional Record's own text, read from GovInfo. Speakers are matched to members by GPO's own metadata. Referandom places each turn on the Clerk's video by matching its words: 84 of 169 spoken turns were found. Turns without a time are still listed; they just can't seek.
Mr. President, I am glad to be able to say that eight Democrats joined Republicans last night to take the first step to reopen the government. And in the very near future, we will be voting on a final package, a clean continuing resolution until January 30 and three bipartisan full-year appropriations bills.
These bills are the Military Construction-VA, Agriculture, and Legislative Branch appropriations, 3 of the 12 bills that Congress needs to pass on an annual basis.
What that means is that yearlong funding for SNAP, for WIC, for veterans, for essential farm programs, and for a number of other critical priorities will be met. I said that we will be voting on the final package in the very near future, and I am hoping that will be hours and not days.
We are on the 41st day of this shutdown. Nutrition benefits are in jeopardy, air travel is in an extremely precarious situation. Our staffs and many, many other government workers have been working for nearly 6 weeks without pay. I could spend an hour talking about all the problems we have seen, which have snowballed the longer this shutdown has gone on. But all of us, Democrat and Republican, who voted
But I would encourage every Member of this body, Democrat and Republican, pro-bill or anti-bill, not to stand in the way of our being able to deliver the coming relief quickly. The American people have suffered for long enough. Let's not pointlessly drag this bill out. Let's get it done, get it over to the House so that we can get this government open.
As I have emphasized since being elected majority leader last November, I remain deeply committed to advancing full-year appropriations bills through regular order. And we have drafted this continuing resolution to extend to January 30, specifically, to give us more time to get this bipartisan work done.
I look forward to taking up additional appropriations bills on the floor in the near future. After 41 days, I am grateful to be able to say that we are close to getting the government reopened. And again, I ask all of my colleagues, on both sides of the aisle, of both parties, to make it possible to quickly pass this bill.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
Mr. President, yesterday, the Senate took a major step forward on the path to reopening the government.
The bill before us is simple. It is clean. It is bipartisan. It is a continuing resolution, and it funds the government through January. It is paired with three full-year appropriations bills.
So let me repeat that: appropriations bills for the full next year.
Now, these are bills that have already passed the Senate with bipartisan support--broad bipartisan support, I would add--and they were negotiated on a bipartisan basis with the House.
They are fully funded in terms of veterans' care, and this is critical. Tomorrow is Veterans Day. Our veterans need to know that we stand behind them.
It is also fully funded on food assistance: SNAP and Women, Infants, and Children.
That is what we are debating here on the floor of the U.S. Senate. I believe it is reasonable, it is responsible, and it is ready to go.
Let's remember that this shutdown has caused serious pain to many, many American families. People have stood in line around the block at food banks all across the country, and that is because 42 million Americans missed their SNAP payments.
Flights were delayed and canceled because control towers are understaffed. People there working are overworked. TSA agents and air traffic controllers have been working for the last 6 weeks without getting paid.
Yesterday, there were 2,300 flight cancellations. It looks like it may be even more than that today. Yesterday was one of the worst travel days in the last 2 years, and today may be worse.
This shutdown has hurt our economy, and it has hurt our country.
The government is finally on the path to reopening. It is the right result. This is what the American people need. They need certainty, and opening the government provides that level of certainty that the American people want, especially heading into the holidays.
I want to thank President Trump. I want to thank my colleagues in the Senate on both sides of the aisle who voted to support that.
The President stood strong when Chuck Schumer stood here and demanded that tens of billions of dollars be sent from the Federal Treasury directly to the bank accounts of health insurance companies. President Trump's leadership protected taxpayers and continues to protect the country.
Let's be clear about what comes next. The Senate is going to use the next few months to pass the additional appropriations bills that will completely fund the government for a full year.
There is a pressing need to strengthen our economy, to secure our border, to invest in our military, to promote fiscal responsibility, and we have to do that after 4 years of high prices and an open border. That is what Republicans in this body and across the hall are fighting for.
Let's be clear. Republicans are making the appropriations process work again. Last year, Senator Schumer refused to bring a single appropriations bill to the floor even though the appropriations committees passed out bipartisan, many times unanimous appropriations bills. Yet the minority leader refused to bring them to the floor. That is no way to run the government. That is no way to run the Senate. That is not leadership.
The debate ahead is also about the many failures of the Obama healthcare law known as ObamaCare. This is a debate Republicans welcome. Healthcare in American is broken and is unaffordable, and it broke the day they passed ObamaCare. Costs have exploded. ObamaCare premiums have gone up 221 percent. That is what has happened since the law passed.
You recall President Obama at the time said that premiums for families would go down by $2,500. It was all wrong. Democrats have no answer for that other than more direct subsidies directly from the Federal Government directly into the bank accounts of the insurance companies. Republicans believe Americans deserve high-quality, affordable healthcare. Americans haven't gotten that since the day ObamaCare became law.
It is time to reopen the government because Americans have waited and suffered too long.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
Mr. President, the last 41 days have exposed the depths of Donald Trump's cruelty. He shut the government down longer than any President in American history. He took innocent kids, veterans, and Federal workers as hostages--political hostages--all because he refuses to do anything--anything--to fix the healthcare crisis and instead keeps pushing policies that will cut people's coverage even more.
Look no further than Donald Trump's war on SNAP. Last night, the First Circuit reaffirmed what lower courts have already said: Donald Trump cannot take 42 million hungry people as hostages. He cannot withhold the benefits they need for food for their families.
Even now, Donald Trump isn't satisfied. Today--even more cruel--he appealed to the Supreme Court yet again to try to get out of paying full SNAP benefits. The President has done a lot of cruel, nasty, mean things over the years, but going all the way up to the Supreme Court-- not once but twice--to ensure kids go hungry is about as cruel a thing as he has ever done. Donald Trump would rather make hungry Americans suffer--make kids suffer, make veterans go hungry, and disabled individuals suffer--than do anything to lower healthcare costs for the American people. The American people will not forget Donald Trump's cruelty and heartlessness over the last 6 weeks.
Let me say something else: The American people have now awoken to Trump's healthcare crisis. Healthcare is once again at the forefront of people's minds. People now see their premiums are about to skyrocket. They are terrified about how they are going to pay for their insurance.
Democrats demanded that we find a way to fix this crisis and quickly, but Republicans have refused to move an inch. So I cannot support the Republican bill that is on the floor because it fails to do anything of substance to fix America's healthcare crisis.
The healthcare crisis is causing millions of families back home sleepless
Doing nothing is unacceptable, but that is the choice the Republican side made in obeisance to Donald Trump. Republicans now own this healthcare crisis. They knew it was coming. We wanted to fix it. Republicans said no, and now it is on them.
When people's out-of-pocket costs double or triple very soon, Americans will know Republicans made it happen. When 60-year-old couples start paying $20,000 a year for health insurance, they will know Republicans made it happen. When 4 million Americans lose insurance, when kids with cancer are priced out of coverage, when families face financial ruin, they will know Republicans made it happen.
The pain will only get worse as more and more people on ACA and with private insurance see their premiums go up and up and up. People out there are struggling. It is harder to make ends meet. Rent is up, groceries are up, people's electricity bills are going up, and now, thanks to Republicans, healthcare costs will spike dramatically.
The past few weeks have exposed with shocking clarity how warped Republicans' priorities truly are. While people's healthcare costs have gone up, Republicans have come across as a party preoccupied with ballrooms, Argentina bailouts, and private jets.
Republicans' breach of trust with the American people is deep and perhaps irreversible. Now that they have failed to do anything to prevent premiums from going up, the anger that Americans feel against Donald Trump and the Republicans is going to get worse.
Republicans had their chance to fix this, and they blew it. Americans will remember Republican intransigence every time they make a sky-high payment on health insurance.
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, after a record government shutdown of 41 days and 14 rollcalls failing to reopen it, the situation was clear. Donald Trump and the Senate Republican leadership were unwilling to do anything to reduce skyrocketing health insurance premiums, a terrible problem facing some 24 million American families.
The shutdown of the government stopped paychecks for thousands of Federal workers, causing real hardship for their families, including our overworked and understaffed air traffic controllers and many other critical members of the Federal workforce.
Food pantries in my State and across the Nation were overwhelmed when President Trump stopped SNAP food payments to 42 million Americans, one-third of whom were children. Food pantries were being overwhelmed as well by unemployed workers who had been laid off or furloughed because of the government shutdown.
So a group of Senators sat down to try to find a bipartisan resolution. After lengthy negotiations, an agreement was reached with the Republican Senate leader John Thune.
We will agree to reopen the government until January 30, 2026. During that time, we will pass three bipartisan appropriations bills that will fully fund SNAP, WIC, and all the veterans programs and finish our work on the remaining spending bills for this fiscal year.
The agreement would also reverse the Trump administration's mass firings during the shutdown and prevent future ones through January 30. We credit Senator Kaine of Virginia for this provision.
Leader Thune has also promised the Democrats an opportunity before mid-December to present a Democratic bill on the floor with proposals to change the law and protect American families from dramatic healthcare premium increases. It is my fervent hope that this ends up being a bipartisan effort. It would be such an achievement of the Senate to finally return to that status.
I have served in the Senate for 29 years, and I have never seen that kind of offer from a Senate majority. During the historic rollcall last night, I walked across the aisle and met with Senator John Thune, the Republican leader. I told him that I was counting on him to keep his word on this agreement. He assured me he would.
The fate of this effort depends on both the Senate and the House of Representatives. After a 7-week absence, Speaker Johnson needs to call his Members back and join us in the hard work that lies ahead.
Many of my friends are unhappy. They think we should have kept our government closed indefinitely to protest the policies of the Trump administration. I share their opinions of this administration but cannot accept a strategy which wages political battle at the expense of my neighbors' paychecks or the food for their children.
Mr. President, I appreciate the opportunity to come to address my colleagues today in the Senate.
During the course of this shutdown--what has now become the longest shutdown in American history--there are a lot of people around the country wondering about what has been at stake in this debate and in this argument. And I think, with every day that has gone by, it has become clearer and clearer what is at stake.
I have heard my Republican colleagues, including the leader of the Republican Party in the Senate, come to the floor to say, over and over again, that not a single Republican in this Chamber, not a single Republican in the United States Congress, voted for the Affordable Care Act when we passed it in 2010.
And for them, that is a badge of honor. That is a badge of honor that they recall from the last extensive debate we had around here about healthcare.
I deeply regret the fact that they are so proud of not having voted for the Affordable Care Act. It is true that there was not a single Republican in the Congress that voted for that bill.
And that bill was far from perfect--I will admit that. Even at the time, I was leading the fight for a public option to be included as part of the Affordable Care Act because I thought it would be a very important part of constraining costs for the American people in our healthcare system. I will say more about that in a minute.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a letter dated February 16, 2010, to then-Leader Harry Reid about the public health insurance option be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:
A Public Option is an Important Tool for Restoring Fiscal Discipline
In the end, it was not included. In the end, we couldn't overcome the objections of the special interests who wanted to deny the American people that choice. But it was an important case to be made, and we made that case.
But I voted in the end for the Affordable Care Act even though the public option was left out of it because it did some really important things for the healthcare system in America. Most of those had to do with making sure that the insurance companies couldn't throw you off your insurance just because you got sick; that cancer and other conditions could no longer be a preexisting condition; that you could still get healthcare even if you had the misfortune, as I have had, of having cancer; that there would be no lifetime cap that would prevent you from being able to provide healthcare or mental health care for your children or for your family just because things had gotten expensive over a period of time.
These were really critical decisions that were made as part of that bill--in addition to the expansion of Medicaid across the country--to be able to ensure that more working people had the chance to be able to afford healthcare, which brings to mind one of the really unusual--sort of the unusual context in which we have had healthcare debates in America, which is that we are the only rich country in the world, we are the only industrialized country among all industrialized countries where healthcare is not a right of citizenship for everyone who lives in that country.
Notwithstanding the fact that we have less access to healthcare than any other industrialized country in the world, it costs twice as much in the United States. It costs twice as much for the Federal Government. It costs twice as much for our society. Most important, it costs twice as much for the people that we represent in our various States, including in the State of Colorado.
People in Colorado, as we meet here, are struggling with the cost of housing, the cost of food, the cost of President Trump's uncertain and unpredictable tariff policy. But they are also continuing to struggle with the cost of healthcare because we are spending twice what any other industrialized country is spending to get a worse result.
I know the President knows this. The President of the Senate knows this because he is a doctor. I have heard him talk about the condition of our healthcare system.
Today in the United States, our life expectancy is 6 years shorter than it is in any of those industrialized countries. What greater indictment could there be of this system? In the 1970s, we had the same life expectancy as the rest of these countries. In fact, we were in the middle. In the years since, we have fallen further and further and further behind as we have spent more and more and more money because the system we have is so shot through with benefits for special interests, among other things, and a complete lack of transparency, which is a fancy way of saying that literally nobody has any idea what anything costs in our healthcare system.
I know the Presiding Officer agrees with that. You can't tell what anything costs when you show up to fill a prescription, when you are in the emergency room. We worked together on the surprise billing issue, which is an important part of this. If you are a senior that is trying to get your prescriptions filled, you go from one pharmacy to the next to the next.
I will never forget as long as I serve in public office and probably for my lifetime the conversation I had with senior citizens in Pueblo where they basically were telling me that their entire retirement was spent fighting to get prescriptions filled that their doctors had prescribed them. Seniors in other industrialized countries don't spend their retirements doing that. Only in the richest country in the world do seniors have to do that, and that is because a lack of transparency, a lack of clarity is built into our healthcare system from top to bottom.
But we took some important steps in the Affordable Care Act. I wish it had included a public option. It didn't. I think that the rate of rise of our healthcare inflation would have been a lot less. By the way, that is what the people that have looked at that bill and scored that bill over the years have said. We have been fighting for it now for a decade and a half. They said that it would actually save the government money because it would lower healthcare costs; it would introduce some competition into our insurance market.
I will say this to the Presiding Officer. He will probably be amused by it. This is the one place where I really am a Bolshevik. I believe in universal healthcare for all Americans. I think we should provide that to people in this country as a right. There is no reason not to do it in the richest country in the world, especially if we can save half of the cost of healthcare that we are providing now.
Families all over my State, all over Colorado, are fighting to get their kid the mental health care they need, are fighting to get their parents the prescriptions they have been prescribed, are fighting to hold on to their own health insurance, because that also has become less and less affordable over the years. That is a fight that no one else in the industrialized world has to have.
I think it is important to point out that most of the people I am talking about--almost all of the people I am talking about are working for a living in this country and still can't afford healthcare, still can't afford the peace of mind that they know that if their kid breaks their leg on a hike or breaks their leg skiing or needs to have the benefit of a mental health counselor, that that is something our safety net provides. Healthcare should be a right. It is a right. And whether you get it or not shouldn't be determined by how wealthy you are or where you live.
I think, given the rhetoric I hear out here sometimes about makers and takers and all that other stuff, it is important to point out that almost all the people I am talking about are working or taking care of children or are retired.
We should have a universal healthcare system in this country, but in the meantime, we shouldn't be making matters worse, which is why this debate is so crazy.
When we passed the Affordable Care Act without a single vote from the Republican Party in the House or the Senate, they said that they were going to make President Obama a one-term President. They said that I was going to lose my Senate seat. In fact, I was asked on national television whether I would lose my Senate seat as a result of my vote on the healthcare bill, and I said: If that is the cost of being here for that period of time, it is worth it. I am happy to lose based on that vote.
They ran ad after ad after ad during that campaign attacking me for being the 60th vote for the Affordable Care Act. And because I survived and a couple other Senators barely survived, we were able to preserve that bill, and 30 million people who would have lost their health insurance in America didn't lose their health insurance.
Then the efforts in the House began to repeal the Affordable Care Act. They voted, I think--I lost count--I think it was 70 times to repeal the Affordable Care Act in the House of Representatives--at least 70 times. They never were able to do it. And the longer it was there, the more people came to see the benefits of the insurance protection, came to see the benefits of the expansion in Medicaid, came to see the benefits of at least having a little bit of comfort that they couldn't just throw you off your insurance because they felt like it.
Now we have found ourselves in a debate related to the tax credits that so many Americans rely on to make insurance just a little bit more affordable. I wouldn't say affordable. I would say a little bit more affordable. I would say barely affordable but somewhat more affordable.
At a moment when grocery prices are what they are, at a moment when rent is what it is, at a moment when we are dealing with the incredible uncertainty these tariffs are causing, it would seem the least we could do is not make matters worse. The least we could do is extend the tax credit so it is a little bit easier for people to buy insurance for themselves and for their families. But just like with the passage of the Affordable Care Act, when not a single Republican supported it; just like when they voted 70 times in the House of Representatives--70 times--to repeal the Affordable Care Act, during this period, this episode, this shutdown, the longest in American history, the Republicans have voted 15 times to take away those benefits from the American people that they are relying on just to make insurance a little bit affordable.
We have taken the position that we shouldn't make matters worse, and that is why I voted again against the budget that has been proposed by President Trump and the Republicans, because they refuse to extend the tax credits. They refuse to make things just a little bit better for the American people.
I can't say I am surprised by the position. Who could be surprised after a vote on the Affordable Care Act where nobody joined it; all those years of voting to repeal it; wanting to make President Obama, they said, a one-term President; and now the vote day after day after day to not provide the American people the benefit of those tax credits.
Before this debate closes, I just want to say again that the current system is in dire need of help.
The American people are hanging on by their fingertips when it comes to the cost and availability of healthcare. There is no rich country in the world that doesn't have a universal system of healthcare. There is no rich country in the world that doesn't routinely supply access to doctors and primary care, access to mental health care for families and for kids, prescription drugs that don't cost an arm and a leg. It is not a pain point for those people in the different phases of their lives, much less a pain point every single day, which it is for the people that I represent in Colorado.
Apparently, President Trump is going to get his way, and those tax credits are not going to be extended by the majority here. And the cost of health insurance in Colorado is going to increase by 200 percent for some people, 300 percent for some people, 400 percent for people that are living in rural areas in my State. That is thousands and thousands of dollars to a typical family that just doesn't have that kind of money.
I just want to remind everybody in this Chamber that when this debate is done, we still have a very important project that we need to be engaged in with the American people, and that is to be able to provide a healthcare system like other wealthy and industrialized countries have provided--where people can count on their healthcare; where they know it is not going to cost them an arm and a leg; where they know, in the course of their lifetime, there are other things they can worry about, like the cost of their rent and the cost of food. But the one thing we are going to do is take care of this problem, just as countries all over the world have taken care of it for their citizens.
I wish I could say that the politics around healthcare have gotten better over the years that I have been here. They really haven't. But I think that the debate that we have had in this moment is going to serve to clarify who is fighting to try to make the system better for the American people and who is not.
I guarantee you this, as long as we have President Trump in the White House and a majority of Republicans in this Chamber, we will never have political leadership that is fighting for universal healthcare, that is fighting for a public option that can be available to every single family in America.
By the way, that is my proposal. It relies on everybody in America to make the best choice for their family. It is not something that would be imposed from here. It would be the chance for every family to say: You know what? I will stay with the private insurance I have or, actually, I would rather be on a system that is run by Medicare, where I know I am going to have access to mental health care and healthcare for my family in a predictable way.
I can see my colleague from Massachusetts. I will close by saying that my heart especially aches for young people across this country, the people the age of my own daughters.
I had a young woman ask me the other day, a recent graduate of Western State in Gunnison, CO--she said: I am coming off my parents' insurance after I am 26.
You will remember that we put that in the healthcare bill. Before that, there was no opportunity for people to stay on their parents' insurance. We did it. We said you get to stay on until you are 26.
She said: Senator, what am I supposed to do, take two or three jobs to pay for my health insurance when I have to come off my parents' insurance?
I said: That is exactly the right question. That is a question that 26-, 27-, and 28-year-olds are not having to ask in any other industrialized country in the world. Only in the United States of America are we running a system where young people in their twenties have to decide between health insurance and their rent, or health insurance and food, or health insurance and the ability to put some money away to save for a house.
We should change that.
I believe strongly that if we ever get to the point where we are expanding Medicare in this country, we should do it for the younger kids that are in their twenties first because they have done absolutely nothing to design the system that they are inheriting.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
Mr. President, our dedicated Federal workers deserve to get paid, and I am glad this deal means that the government will reopen, that public servants will be returning to work, and that they will receive their paychecks, including backpay.
I am also pleased that this deal will prevent Donald Trump from further delaying SNAP benefits for hungry children, senior citizens, and families. Using hungry people as political pawns,
But this legislation does nothing--nothing--concrete to lower costs or protect healthcare for millions of Americans from MAGA Republican attacks. There are 22 million Americans who are going to see dramatic increases in their healthcare costs at the end of this year, 22 million Americans who are going to be very concerned about the healthcare of their families.
I cannot support this deal. I cannot support a deal that does not say to those 22 million American families, including 337,000 of them in the State of Massachusetts, that we have not been able to reach an agreement here because Republicans refused to come to the table to talk about their healthcare costs that are about to skyrocket--and for many of those 22 million families, skyrocket out of the ability of those families to even have health insurance. This is on top of their housing bills, their grocery bills, their electricity bills--all of their day- to-day needs that are absolutely skyrocketing.
And, of course, if they can't already deal with all of those other bills, seeing those bills skyrocket thousands of dollars for their healthcare or tens of thousands of dollars for their healthcare, because of the Republicans' decision to kill critical Affordable Care Act tax credits, is going to be devastating for those families.
I have one constituent, Jeff from Natick, who, right now, because of the healthcare tax credits, has a $30,000 bill for his stage IV cancer drugs--lung cancer. If they expire, his bill is $300,000 a year. That is what we should be debating out here.
By the way, there are 22 million stories just like that one that are about to hit American families. This health insurance timebomb, coupled with deep cuts to Medicaid, will also be a brutal one-two punch which devastates community hospitals throughout the United States, leaving millions of Americans with reduced care or no care at all.
Here is what we have right now. Twenty-two million American families are starting to think about what is going to be on their table for Thanksgiving--just coming up in 2, 3 weeks for all of them. They are saying: We are losing the tax subsidies, the tax credits that help us to pay for our healthcare bills. So 22 million Americans will have that as their primary conversation this Thanksgiving.
The Republicans who serve in the House and Senate are not going to have that conversation because their healthcare coverage is going to continue.
What about those 22 million American families, this Christmas or this Thanksgiving, who are losing their benefits? What are the Republicans saying to them, because they are going to be scared? They are going to be angry that they will not be able to afford this holiday or any holiday in the future because their healthcare bills are just going to be going up by thousands--tens of thousands--of dollars a year, which they don't have.
Again, it is in the context of their electricity rates, their food costs, their clothing costs. Everything is skyrocketing for them, and they are not getting raises that will help them to pay for it--22 million American families.
Let me just tell you, I heard from Laurie in North Truro. The insurance for her and her husband is increasing from $6,000 a year to $26,400 a year.
Who can afford to pay more on health insurance? Who can afford to pay $20,000 more on their health insurance and just get the notice now that it is over on December 31, and have the Republicans just walking away from that problem for Laurie and for 22 million other Americans?
Now, they are going to have to decide: Do they take the funding from retirement savings or do they just do without other things in their families' lives, because $20,000 is a lot for a family who are not millionaires?
Millionaires don't qualify for this tax credit. It is just regular families. It is middle-class families. That is who qualifies. They just don't have 20 extra grand under the cushion that can pay for their health insurance.
This is a tragedy in the making and one that we can avoid. But let's not fool ourselves. Trump and MAGA Republicans have been shutting down the government since Inauguration Day--gutting Medicare, gutting Medicaid, gutting the Affordable Care Act. That was their big vote in the first week of July of this year, 2025--gutting, gutting, gutting, Medicare, Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act.
They have been committing the greatest healthcare heist in history, and it is all to pay for tax cuts for billionaires. They are looting the healthcare for middle-class families, poor families, in order to pay for tax breaks for people who already have too much.
The top three hedge fund managers in the United States have more wealth than the bottom 50 percent of our entire population combined. Think about that. It is that bottom 50 percent that qualifies for Medicaid, that qualifies for the Affordable Care Act tax subsidies. That is who we are talking about right now. Those are the people who are going to be most negatively impacted.
The American people want us to stop this healthcare heist. They don't want Democrats to be driving the getaway car with all of those tens of billions--hundreds of billions--of dollars which will just be transferred into the bank accounts of the wealthiest people in our country. So we should just be fighting for transformative policies to fix our broken healthcare system and bring us back from the brink of this crisis. That is what the American people want us to do. That is what they want us to fight for.
Even when it is hardest, even when we are in the darkest moments, we have to remember what we are fighting for. A better future is still possible, one where one missed medical bill won't lead to bankruptcy; a future where families don't have to choose between a prescription and a meal, a future where no malignant corporate greed in our healthcare system shutters hospitals and endangers patients, a future where universal healthcare is taken for granted and not taken away, a future where families can afford their healthcare and their rent and their electricity bills and childcare and to save money for college or vacation or retirement. That is the future that we should be fighting for, but the American people did not see that from the U.S. Senate yesterday.
So that is where we are right now. We are in the throes of a healthcare crisis wherein 22 million Americans this Thanksgiving will be at their tables--if they can even afford to celebrate Thanksgiving-- looking at tens of thousands of additional dollars, potentially, on their healthcare bills. It is a catastrophe looming.
The Republicans, so far, have refused to do anything about it. That is what we should be discussing. That is what we should be debating: How do we solve this problem? Instead, the Republicans are just punting this issue. They are absolutely ignoring the consequences for those 22 million American families.
So I will just say this: These families, they are scared. These families, they are angry.
But I will say this: In addition to those 22 million families, tens of millions of other families are angry for them. They are pissed that people are going to be victimized by having their tax credits just be pulled away from them for their healthcare bills, and then that healthcare is going to be unaffordable for them--22 million people and their families in our country. That is what we should be talking about here.
Now the Republicans, at the eleventh hour, are asking us to trust them that they will have a vote on extending the tax credits Americans rely on to afford their insurance.
Remember when, earlier this year, Trump promised, We are not going to touch Medicaid? Remember that? Trump said: We are not going to touch Medicaid. Four months later, he decimated it. Remember when Trump promised he would love and cherish Medicare? Then he slashed a half a trillion dollars from Medicare. How are we supposed to trust him?
So, to all of the Senate Republicans who are inclined to oppose a simple 1-year extension of the Affordable Care Act premium tax credits when a vote is held in December--credits that are hugely popular in both red and blue States--just remember that you do so at your own political peril. The American people are watching. They are
Thanksgiving is going to be the worst Thanksgiving ever for millions of families in their knowing that they are going to lose their health insurance, and the Republicans can do something about it. Unless and until they do so, then we are about to hit a healthcare tragedy that could have been avoidable and that the Republicans have, in fact, created.
This is a man-made crisis, and that man is the President of the United States, and the Republicans here on the floor of the Senate are following him blindly in a way that is going to result in harm to 22 million Americans and their families. So this is the moment. This is the time. This is the place. This is where people should be standing up to fight for those people.
Health is the first wealth. Health is the most important wealth. Without your health, you have nothing. You have nothing. Everything else is built on health--everything--and the Republicans are taking away that healthcare from 22 million Americans.
This is not the way to send families into Thanksgiving and Christmas. This is not the way we should be treating people. We are the wealthiest country in the history of the world. Yale University has made it very clear that 50,000 people additionally are going to die per year if all of Trump's healthcare cuts go into place. That is 500,000 people dying over the next 10 years if these healthcare premiums--Medicaid--are slashed. That is on this body. That is on this Senate. That is on the Republican leadership.
All I can say to you is that this is a mistake; it is a historic mistake; it is cruel; it is wrong; it is not what we should be doing to those who are the most vulnerable, to those who are the most in need in our country; and that is what the Republicans are about to perpetrate upon this country.
We are better than this. You can't have trillions of dollars in tax breaks for the wealthiest and then say we don't have enough money for those who are the sickest. If you have room for a tax break only after you have taken care of the sickest people--the people most in need of healthcare in our society--that is when you have room for tax breaks for billionaires. The Republicans are doing just the opposite: First, tax breaks for billionaires; then we will see what is left over.
``Oh,'' they say. ``We can't afford healthcare for 22 million Americans. We can't afford to take care of their families because we don't have enough money.''
Why don't you have enough money? Because you gave the tax breaks to billionaires. You gave the tax breaks to billionaires. That is why you don't have enough money.
And who are you going to take it out on? Are you going to say, all of a sudden, with your green eyeshades, that you are really concerned about the Federal budget deficit? And are you going to take it out upon those who are the least healthy? to those most in need of help in our society? No. We are better than that.
So this is a historic mistake, but just remember that Republicans have always harbored an ancient animosity toward Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act. They voted against all of those programs. Now, with Donald Trump, they have the ability to gut them, and that is what they are doing. That is what they are doing. When they have a chance to stand up and say, ``No. Let's be reasonable. Let's keep the healthcare subsidies, which are most needed,'' they are just walking away right now.
Donald Trump operates under ``The Godfather, Part 1'' rules. He gives them offers they can't refuse. And we saw that with Senators who tried to stand up to say: No. The Medicaid cuts are too deep. The Affordable Care Act cuts are too deep.
Trump just called them and said: Your career is over. You will not be a Senator again.
So now we are seeing the remaining Senators who are here who are Republicans, and they are just saying: Whatever you want, Mr. Trump, whatever Russell Vought wants at OMB, and whatever Stephen Miller wants, we will do. We are not going to have a negotiation. We are not going to sit down.
Before they cut the Medicaid and the Medicare programs back in July, did they negotiate with us? No, they did not. They refused to negotiate with Democrats at all. That is who they are. They saw their one opportunity to slash it once and for all.
All I can say is that we are in an incredible moment. The Republican House Members still are not back in Washington. They have been in a 6- week witness protection program. They refuse to come back to Washington. They refuse to sit down. They refuse to negotiate. So we are witnessing Robin Hood in reverse. We are seeing money taken from the poorest and given to the richest--that is what this is all about-- and what they are taking from the poorest and the middle class is their healthcare. It is their protection.
So, from my perspective, this is a mistake--it is a historic mistake--and it is a mistake that will come back to haunt the Republican Party at the ballot box next year.
With that, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
Mr. President, I have been coming to the floor to speak about how we can go forward in a way that actually lowers the cost of having health insurance for those who are on the exchanges and begin to build a future where we lower the cost of health insurance and healthcare for everybody whether you are on an ObamaCare exchange or have employer-sponsored insurance or you name it. We know there is going to be a vote--as part of this agreement to open the government-- on what to do about the exchanges; so we need to be thinking and talking about the solutions that are out there that benefit the American people.
Of course, the issue underlying it is that people cannot afford their health insurance. They cannot afford their healthcare. Those are two different things, by the way. The cost of healthcare is what dictates, theoretically, at least, the price of health insurance. If you lower the cost of healthcare, then you lower the price of health insurance. I saw this as a physician when I was practicing in a hospital for the uninsured for 20 years--I should say the uninsured and the poorly insured. There were middle-income people who could not afford their insurance and/or could not afford their healthcare.
So how do we get out of it? Well, first, it is complicated. We have got to be creative, and we have got to abandon set positions. Sometimes we are in this Chamber, and all we do is stick to our guns, and if the other party suggests something, we automatically reject it. We have got to move beyond that, not as, ``Oh, my gosh. If the other side proposes it, I reject it,'' but rather as, ``Wait a second. Let's listen. Is there a solution here that can benefit the American people?''
ObamaCare tried to make and has tried to make healthcare insurance affordable by just throwing billions at it. The problem with that is that it doesn't make healthcare affordable. It just makes the health insurance premium less expensive for those who are on the exchanges. This actually drives up the cost of insurance for some and does nothing about the underlying healthcare costs driving up the premiums for others.
So what is my proposal? I propose, instead of paying insurance companies to manage more of our billions, why don't we trust the American people to manage their own resources or to manage their own care with something which I call a prefunded Federal flexible spending account?
Let's first talk about the enhanced premium tax credit, which is at the center of this discussion. It is just a primer. Let's get the basics.
There are two types of premium tax credits used to fund insurance for those who are on the ObamaCare exchanges. One is the baseline tax credit, in the original ObamaCare law, which helps pay for the premiums for those who earn less than 400 percent of the Federal poverty level, but that didn't control costs. So, during the COVID epidemic, the Biden administration put in something called the enhanced premium tax credit that provides some additional benefits for those less than 400 percent of Federal poverty, but it gave additional benefits for those above 400
Let's be clear: The discussion we are having now is not about the baseline premium tax credits; it is about the enhanced premium tax credits, which started under the Biden administration.
So it begs the question: Why were enhanced premium tax credits necessary? Well, as we have said, the cost of healthcare has continued to rise. You can argue, if you are going to an insurance company and you are saying, ``We are going to give you more money if healthcare costs more,'' that they do not have the incentive to help control those healthcare costs.
Now, I am not here to bash insurance companies. They are essential to our society. So I will just put that out there. But if you have the choice of giving the money to the patient for her to manage it or giving it to the insurance company, I think we should give it to the patient.
So the question is: Can we put in programs that lower the cost of healthcare? How long will it be before it takes effect, and what do we do in the interim?
Well, it is too soon this coming year to put in programs to lower the costs of healthcare, but it is not too soon to put in programs that empower patients to manage their costs and give them the money, as opposed to giving it to the health insurance companies, but to do that, we have got to think differently.
So how do we lower costs for the coming year for the individual who is on the exchanges? It is important to realize that the total cost of having health insurance is not just the premium but that it includes the deductible and the copay. So if you can help with the deductible and the copay, that is as effective, or even more effective, than helping with the premiums.
So what I am proposing is something which actually helps the patient become a wise consumer of healthcare, helping her with the premiums and the copays, working with the health insurance policy but in a way which lowers their cost.
Let me be clear: This is not the official Republican position. President Trump has endorsed the concept, but it is not, say, for Leader Thune. But I am the chairman of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, which has jurisdiction over this, and we will be having hearings in the near future to address this. And my motivation is as a Senator and as a doctor who wants to make healthcare more affordable for all Americans.
Let's discuss what I am calling a prefunded flexible spending account. First, here is what we currently have: an enhanced premium tax credit, which is going to take $26 billion next year and give it to insurance companies that tell the patient what she can buy and what she cannot buy.
I have a typo here. I fixed it yesterday, but I have got to fix it once more.
Twenty percent of the money--20 percent of the $26 billion going out the door to help pay for insurance premiums--actually will go for profits and overhead of the insurance company. So let me just change it right here. Again, I had a typo yesterday, and I have a typo today.
Twenty percent of the money we are giving to the insurance companies under the enhanced premium tax credits goes for profit and it goes for administrative overhead. Only 80 percent goes to pay for the insurance premium to pay for healthcare costs for the person who is a recipient.
Let's speak of what I am describing, the prefunded flexible spending account--prefunded because you take the enhanced premium tax credit, instead of giving it to the insurance company, you give it to the individual and her family through a flexible spending account--a flexible spending account which millions of Americans already have.
She can use this money to pay for prescription drugs, for dental work, for medical care, eyeglasses, orthodontia--much more flexibility than through a traditional insurance company.
The key thing is, whereas, if we give this money to the insurance company, 20 percent goes for profit and overhead. If we give it to the patient, 100 percent goes to healthcare that she needs. One hundred percent goes to her family's healthcare needs--100 percent, not 80 percent. This is better value for their healthcare dollar.
Now, who would get it? Every eligible American citizen on the exchange would receive a prefunded flexible spending account equal in value to the enhanced premium tax credit they would have received had the money gone to their insurance company. It doesn't pay for insurance premiums, but it pays for the actual healthcare that they actually need.
I am pleased to say President Trump has tweeted in support of the concept. Of course, I am pleased to be aligned with the President on this. He says he recommends that instead of giving hundreds of billions of dollars--and this is President Trump's rhetoric--to money-sucking insurance companies, the money should ``BE SENT DIRECTLY TO THE PEOPLE SO THEY CAN PURCHASE THEIR OWN, MUCH BETTER HEALTHCARE.''
Notice the caps. That is a President Trump tweet.
I am pleased to be aligned with the President. But for my Democratic colleagues who want a guarantee that whatever we pass will get a vote on the floor of the House of Representatives, this is effectively a guarantee that if we pass a program like this, it can get a vote on the floor of the House of Representatives. If the President asks Speaker Mike Johnson to bring it up for a vote, Speaker Mike Johnson will.
Just imagine, my Democratic colleagues, how do we get something that 100 percent of the money goes for real healthcare; it doesn't go to insurance companies where 20 percent goes for profit and overhead; it is a system already used by millions of Americans, and, may I say, it all but guarantees to get a vote on the floor of the House of Representatives? This tweet gives them that assurance.
Some immediately begin to criticize the President, assuming that he was going to take all the money going for health insurance premiums and put it in one of these flexible spending accounts. That is not true. Go back to what I said earlier. We only are talking about the enhanced premium tax credits which would prefund this flexible spending account. We are not talking about--we are not talking about--the baseline premium tax credits that are part of the original ObamaCare law.
By the way, Republicans want people to have coverage. This doctor who used to take care of the uninsured wants people to have coverage.
The more I discuss this--and this is the fourth or fifth time I have given this talk--I am pleased to say that some of my Democratic colleagues are saying: Hey, we can talk about it. I am not quite there yet, but I see the wisdom of it. I am willing to move forward with it.
And I thank them for that. I want everybody in the Senate to put aside their prejudice, which sometimes is that if one side proposes it, it must be wrong.
I will say to my Democratic colleagues, what I am proposing with the prefunded flexible spending account is actually more closely aligned with how the original authors of the Affordable Care Act wanted that legislation to be implemented.
I find it ironic that some of my Democratic colleagues are rejecting something which is closer to the original bill. But I think they are rejecting it, in part, because of misunderstanding, lack of knowledge, and maybe for some because a Republican is proposing it.
Put that trench warfare mentality behind you. Think about, could this be better for the American people? Can this accomplish the goal of making the possession of health insurance and paying for my family's healthcare more affordable?
For those who think this is too complicated, let me say that 72 percent of Americans who get their health insurance through a Federal employer, a State employer, a local employer--72 percent of us have a flexible spending account. My family and I have a flexible spending account.
Forty-seven percent of Americans who are in private insurance have access to a flexible spending account. It doesn't mean they take it, but it just means they have access.
Millions of Americans are already using flexible spending accounts. What I am proposing, let's just give the same option to people who are on the individual exchanges.
By the way, let me just make the point, my wife and I, our family, we are on the ObamaCare Small Business Exchange. Everybody in Congress is on an ObamaCare Small Business Exchange. I am getting my flexible spending account through an exchange. All we are saying is open up the window just a little bit to allow those who are on the individual exchanges to likewise access that which I am getting through the Small Business Exchange.
This merely extends what is current law for some people on their health plan to extend it to those who are within the individual exchange.
The Federal Government can take the laws, the tools, the vendors, the Department it is already using and implement--implement--a prefunded flexible spending account for those on the individual exchange.
Why is that important? Because that can happen for plan year 2026. I am asking: What are we going to do about the people next year? This is about next year. How can we help those folks signing up for insurance right now for 2026? This brings them benefit right now for 2026.
Let me now kind of go through the differences between the enhanced premium tax credit and a federally funded flexible spending account. This is kind of a money chart, if you will. If you are with me in concept that maybe this could work, hopefully--hopefully--I can convince people who might be watching, my Democratic colleagues who might be listening to give power to the patients instead of giving enhanced premium tax credits to insurance companies.
OK. Who gets the money? Under the enhanced premium tax credit, the insurance company gets the money, and 20 percent of it goes for overhead and for profit. Under the prefunded flexible spending account, a patient and the family controls the money.
What can it be used for? The enhanced premium tax credit, it can be used for insurance premiums. Under the prefunded flexible spending account, it can be used for real care, if you will: dental visits, physician visits, eyeglasses, prescriptions, orthodontia. It has more flexibility than the traditional insurance policy has.
Who makes the decision? Well, the golden rule: He who has the gold makes the rule. Under the enhanced premium tax credit going to insurance companies, the insurance company makes the decision. They decide what care you have, where you get it, and how much you are charged.
When you have a prefunded flexible spending account, the patient makes the difference. The patient makes the decision. She decides where the dollars go. I always use the feminine because women make 95 percent of healthcare decisions for themselves, their family, for their spouse, for their boyfriend. I always chuckle--guys are the stupidest people in the world when it comes to their healthcare, maybe a couple of other things. But the people who care about this are typically women, and so I speak to her.
Does it lower cost? Under the enhanced premium tax credit, there is really minimal incentive for the insurance company to attempt to lower costs; so, therefore, as costs go up, so do premiums. On the other hand, under a prefunded flexible spending account, you empower patients to shop, which drives competition.
One example: I was once stopped on the street by someone who had seen one of my talks. She goes: You talked about using cash or using my flexible spending account or using my health savings account to buy something. There was an MRI order for my son's shoulder. My deductible was $5,000. The MRI was going to cost $2,000. I was going to have to pay $2,000 for the MRI of my son's shoulder.
I said: Wait, do you have a cash price? Well, your cash price is $600. If you don't want to go to the insurance company, your cash price is $600.
Now, the typical ObamaCare plan has a deductible anywhere from $3,000 to $6,800. So if we are talking about an MRI costing $2,000, you are still within the deductible. If you have a flexible spending account, you are not paying for that out of your pocket, you are paying for it with your flexible spending account. And you can ask: What if I give you cash instead, and they will give you the lower price, not the higher price if there is a lower cash price. And there often is.
This turns that woman, that family, into an informed consumer, and that begins to drive down the costs.
This is the essence of giving power to the patients. The patient picks the best deal for her health and the best deal for her family's pocketbook. The prefunded, flexible spending account doesn't treat someone like a dependent of the Federal Government; it treats them as somebody who can make wise decisions for themselves and empowers them to make wiser decisions than the insurance company itself can.
Now, some would ask, how much money does it cost? The first year, depending on how we structure it, it might cost just as much as our enhanced premium tax credits. Why? Because we are going to take the amount of money that would go for the enhanced premium tax credit and put it into a prefunded, flexible spending account.
My Democratic colleagues should like that. They should say: Wait a second. It is still getting the same value--in fact, I would argue, better value because when you give it to the insurance company, 20 percent goes to profit and overhead, and when you give it to the patient, 100 percent goes to real care. But the cost the first year will be about the same.
But I will repeat: The difference is where the money goes. Because it goes 100 percent for real care, there is more value for every Federal dollar.
Once more, it is in the family's vested financial interest to purchase wisely, and that begins to drive down healthcare costs. That, coupled with other reforms in year 2 of this program--in year 2--would begin to reflect itself in lower premiums.
To conclude, here is the choice before us: We can keep paying insurance companies to hide the cost of higher premiums behind confusing bills, rising premiums, and a system which actually raises costs for many or we can give the patient the tool and trust her to pay for her care directly at fair prices, with transparency.
If we will, it puts patients before insurance companies, it encourages competition, it encourages and rewards smart choices, and it begins to make healthcare truly affordable--not by inflating subsidies but by unleashing the power of the consumer.
Let's stop writing blank checks to bureaucracies and insurance companies. Let's invest in our fellow Americans--if you will, invest in you.
This is going to be a little risky. We are doing something different. You will be saying: Oh, I am not just going to be a Democrat. I am not just going to be a Republican. I actually want to try to come together to find a solution to benefit all Americans.
Imagine that. Congress putting partisan politics behind us to come up with a creative solution that actually benefits Americans--a little bit out of our comfort zone. It is what we should be doing every day. I call upon us to do that today.
We have to be willing to take the risk to solve the problem, not be afraid to do something different. We have to be willing to tackle complex problems, not retreat--not retreat--to our trench, which is labeled ``Republican'' or ``Democrat,'' and be afraid to come out to find a creative solution.
I am a Republican, but more than that, I am a doctor who for 20 years tried to care for those who could not afford their healthcare or their health insurance. I invite my 99 colleagues to join me in trying to find affordable healthcare and affordable insurance for our fellow Americans.
Let's be creative. Let's do it. And let's not just reject the proposal because maybe my side or your side proposed it. Let's fix healthcare. Let's give patients the power.
I yield the floor.
(Mr. HUSTED assumed the Chair.)
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
Mr. President, we are getting encouraging signs that we may be having some votes tonight. I hope that proves to be true and the Senate does its part to get out of the shutdown.
I was thinking, though, I have been telling a lot of staff around here and everybody else: I apologize for us not getting our work done.
I think a lot of people don't realize how many people around here haven't been paid for 41 days. Do you know who they are? Everybody you can see in this room and every one of your staff members and everybody else who has been doing the hard work, showing up.
I was thinking yesterday, with all the cars in the driveway, those young people that are coming in to pick up their Members and take them back to their apartments, condos, wherever they live here--those kids are doing that on a weekend and not getting paid either.
I also think that getting out of the shutdown and getting the tens of millions of people that are hanging in the lurch across the country--it is just a good thing.
It is a shame we got here, but I want to thank the Members on both sides of the aisle that have finally decided that we need to do our work here, pass a continuing resolution, pass actual regular order bills, and prove this place can work.
The work is not done. We have about 90 days now to fix the other part that we couldn't get agreement on. Let's make sure we start doing the work now so that every Capitol Police officer, every Sergeant at Arms, every Senate staff, and all the people down on the dais who are working extra long hours actually get paid for the hard work they do.
Mr. President, during the course of tonight's debate, we will be voting on whether to table an item in the amendment lineup in order to submit an amendment that would ban pocket rescissions.
Well, that is a fancy name. What does a pocket rescission mean? It means the President can steal the power of the purse from Congress, which is assigned to Congress in the Constitution, by submitting a proposal to undo spending for a program in the last 45 days of the fiscal year.
And then, because under our rules there is 45 days to consider it, as a grace period, even though Congress never votes affirmatively in support of this proposal, the clock runs out and the funding for the program dies. It is kind of like the clock running out on midnight on Cinderella's stagecoach, and, suddenly, it is a pumpkin.
In this case, it is the funding for some key program in healthcare, in housing, or in education. Or maybe it is an investment in infrastructure. Maybe it is something that creates good-paying jobs. Maybe it is the research that keeps our economy humming far into the future. Maybe it is energy policy. But one person--the President--says he doesn't like that program and decides to kill it by submitting a proposal to kill it in the last 45 days, and the clock runs out before Congress can vote. And then, even without Congress voting, the program dies.
This is an outright violation of the power of the purse assigned in the Constitution to Congress--to us. So we have a bipartisan responsibility to defend our congressional power--our congressional spending power.
Let's consider the difference between a democracy and an authoritarian government. In a democracy, you have folks who are elected from every corner of the country. They come together with their different life experiences. They come together with their different insights. They come together understanding that the needs in one part of the country are different than another. And they create spending programs and spending levels appropriate to address the challenges in every corner of the Nation. That is called a democracy.
Well, what about an authoritarian government? What does that look like? That is one person, a Chief Executive, who issues fiats and kills programs, and says things like: I am ending that grant program because it is not in alignment with my priorities. I am killing that program because it is not in alignment with my priorities.
That is an authoritarian government, and that is what a ``pocket recession'' is--an authoritarian killing programs when the Constitution gives that power to Congress, not the Executive.
So later on, I will ask all of us to stand up and defend our Constitution. I do hope that Members on both sides of the aisle will actually proceed to give that defense to the vision of a democracy, rather than granting authoritarian power to an authoritarian tyrant named Donald Trump.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following the remarks of Senators Murray and Collins, the postcloture time be expired, and the Senate vote on adoption of the motion to proceed; further, if agreed to, and following recognition of the majority leader, it be in order for Senators Baldwin, Sanders, Slotkin, and Merkley to speak for up to 5 minutes each, prior to a Baldwin motion to table and a Merkley motion to table, if made; and following the disposition of that vote, if it is not agreed to, Senator Paul be recognized to speak for up to 9 minutes, and the Senate then vote in relation to the Paul amendment No. 3941; further, that following disposition of the Paul amendment, the Senate vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the Collins substitute amendment No. 3937; and if cloture is invoked, all postcloture time be expired, the pending amendments other than the Collins substitute be withdrawn, and the Senate vote on adoption of the Collins substitute amendment; and if adopted, the Senate vote on the motion to invoke cloture on H.R. 5371, as amended; finally, if cloture is invoked, all postcloture time be expired, the bill, as amended, be read the third time, and the Senate vote on passage of H.R. 5371, as amended; and if passed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate, and the mandatory quorum calls be waived.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there an objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. President, like so many people in this country, I am so outraged that Republicans have refused to lift a finger to save so many families from the skyrocketing healthcare premiums all year long. I voted no on last night's vote because I do believe we need to address healthcare costs before we move forward.
There is simply no time left to kick the can down the road when it comes to saving the ACA tax credits. We are already 10 days into enrollment. Yet we have Republicans saying: Why should we stop premiums from skyrocketing when we never really wanted lower premiums in the first place?
We have Republicans talking about going back to the good old days of high-risk pools, which meant people with cancer could not get health insurance. We have Speaker Johnson bragging that Republicans strengthened healthcare by making the biggest cut to Medicaid in history. That is like saying you strengthened a ship by throwing the passengers overboard.
And when Democrats offered a clean 1-year extension of the tax credits, which is truly the most straightforward and commonsense thing we can do for people facing gigantic premium hikes this year, Republicans said: Never ever, ever, ever.
They called it ``political terrorism.'' And to really put a fine point on it, they fired up the old bad ideas machine to try and find a new way to repeal the ACA. Republicans have gone from saying nothing about healthcare costs all year long to saying later, later, later, even after we are over a week into open enrollment and wasting every bit of time we had for real negotiations.
Then, incredibly, Republicans started saying: Let's scrap the Affordable Care Act altogether. Let's end protections for preexisting conditions. By refusing to work with Democrats on a solution before open enrollment started, Republicans have already pushed millions of Americans off the healthcare cliff.
The only question was--and is--could we throw them a rope back up? Could Congress get something done and stem some of the bleeding Republicans already caused? Yes. By passing a clean
But right away, Republicans said they wouldn't even consider it. I believe that we should keep pressing on that fight as time is of the essence, and the clock has nearly run out. The reality is, there is a point where it will be too late to make a meaningful difference on the healthcare premiums, and I don't believe there is some magical date set in stone, but that is coming up pretty fast.
It is pretty much now or never, and Republicans are essentially saying never to stopping the worst of the MAGA healthcare hike.
Now, here is the important thing: This fight is not over, far from it, because I and many of us have no intention of letting Republicans off the hook. No one should doubt for a single second who is to blame for the skyrocketing healthcare costs: Republicans and Republicans alone.
When families across America are paying the price that they will see for Republican inaction every month, I will make sure every single one of them remembers the same Republicans who did everything in their power to make tax breaks for billionaires permanent refused to even negotiate one year of healthcare tax credits for working families at a tiny fraction of the cost.
Unfortunately, here we are, and it seems clear Republicans are feeling no urgency to act on healthcare before it is too late, even a quick simple extension to help families.
But, I want to be clear, while I cannot vote for this overall deal today, not when we still need to address healthcare, I do absolutely support the appropriations bills and CR that we will move forward which do take meaningful steps to reject drastic cuts and extreme policies pushed by both Trump and House Republicans and make sure that Congress--not Trump--is in charge of Federal spending.
It is important that Democrats were at the table on the CR and our first three funding bills and used our spot at that table to fight for hard-working families in America. The difference is clear and a sharp contrast between the bills that were released yesterday and the bills written by the House Republicans and the budget put forward by President Trump.
In our bills, Democrats were able to secure real wins for folks back home and fight off painful, senseless cuts and extreme policy.
On the CR, we made sure to protect Federal workers, both by ensuring they receive backpay they are owed, something that has been debated extensively, and by reversing the punitive RIFs done by this administration during the administration and blocking them from doing more this year.
In the Agriculture appropriations bill, while Trump and House Republicans fought to make steep cuts to WIC that would have seriously cut benefits for millions of women and kids, we successfully fought together to keep WIC fully funded. This bill ensures that 7 million moms and babies will get the full nutrition benefits they rely on.
We also sustained key investments in our rural communities because we rejected a Trump funding takeover. We protected housing support in rural communities and vital agricultural research happening across the country, including in my home State of Washington at WSU.
We stopped Trump from blowing a truly massive hole in FDA's budget which would have slowed drug approvals and seriously endangered our food supply.
None of this is inconsequential. All of this matters. And I want to thank Chair Hoeven and Ranking Member Shaheen for all of their good work on that vital bill to our communities. In the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs bills, we were able to secure funding to make sure we were taking care of our veterans and our servicemembers and ensure that this administration keeps its promises to our veterans by ensuring staffing of critical services such as the crisis hotline centers.
I want to thank Chair Boozman and Ranking Member Ossoff for all their good work on this critical bill to our veterans and our servicemembers.
And, lastly, on the Legislative Branch bill, which is the smallest bill, it covers the important needs of this institution, from protecting GAO and CBO, the Architect of the Capitol, our Capitol Police, and other Agencies that actually make this place work, to make sure our offices have what they need to take care of our constituents and keep our campus safe.
We should all appreciate the hard work that went into completing this bill. I want to thank Chair Mullin and Ranking Member Heinrich for all of their work on that important bill and the critical matters within to every Senator in this Chamber.
Now, obviously, those are not the bills I would have written on my own. I have concerns we were not able to address in these bills, and Republicans were not open to some of them. But I still want to do more when it comes to delivering critical investments for communities in our country, and I will, as always, keep pushing my colleagues every day.
But we did secure real wins for folks back home when Democrats and Republicans were able to sit down at the table together on funding, and they are immeasurably better than Trump and Vought holding the pen-- which is what the slush fund CR that we have been operating on this year allowed.
I am proud for what we have been able to negotiate to protect key programs our families and communities rely on and protect our authority as lawmakers who are here to be a voice for our constituents. I want to emphasize that I really appreciate the work of my counterpart, the senior Senator from Maine Susan Collins, who has done incredible work on all these bills.
I want to thank our subcommittee chairs and ranking members and all of our staff who have worked hard to put these bills together, and I want to make clear I deeply appreciate the partnership of my colleagues on the Senate Appropriations Committee who have all worked in good faith during these very difficult times and these very difficult negotiations.
No matter what, these bills need to get done and our staff put in late nights and our chairs and ranking members held countless conversations to compromise and work toward solutions.
I hope to continue building on that progress and showing what it does look like when we come together and put families before politics.
I look forward to getting our next minibus up on the floor to move multiple needed bills along that we have marked up in the committee and give those to conference, and I hope we can be on that package as soon as possible.
I look forward to working with the Senator from Maine and working to get those final bills completed, so they, too, can be conferenced with the House as soon as possible.
And I want to thank all of our committee members and staffs for their incredible work on these critical bills. We have a lot of work ahead, and I know we can get there.
Passing full-year funding bills helps to ensure that Congress--not Trump or Russ Vought--decides how taxpayer dollars are spent. We should never turn the keys over to Trump and his Cabinet Secretaries, allowing them to make unilateral cuts and shift funding around however they please.
Every day, they prove in a new way how critical it is that Congress assert its authority and rein in their chaos, and I will continue to work to do that on the Appropriations Committee.
But I also need to continue fighting to stop the MAGA healthcare hike for as long as there is still time left on this clock to fix this. The reality is, there is a point where it will be too late to make a meaningful difference, but until we reach that point of no return, we do have to fight tooth and nail to force Republicans to actually work with us on that issue. And because, in this package, Republicans have still refused to address the healthcare crisis families are facing right now, a crisis that gets worse and harder to fix every single day, I will be voting no.
Mr. President, this is the 41st day of an entirely unnecessary government shutdown; a shutdown that never should have occurred; a shutdown that has caused tremendous harm to the American people, to our national security, to our entire country; a shutdown that has resulted in Federal employees being furloughed, laid
We finally have the ability tonight to end this shutdown. We have put forth, the Appropriations Committee, working in a bipartisan way with Members on both sides of the aisle and in both Chambers, a package of bills that includes a continuing resolution that will reopen government immediately once it is passed by this Senate, the House, and signed into law by the President.
It is legislation that due to incredibly good work by Senators Jeanne Shaheen, Tim Kaine, Katie Britt, the White House, and many of us, will ensure that those Federal employees who have been furloughed or laid off or forced to work without pay will receive their backpay, will be recalled to their jobs if they were laid off as a result of this shutdown.
That will make a huge difference to these Federal employees who have worked so hard to serve the people of our Nation.
This package of bills also includes three--three--yearlong appropriations bills that were passed by overwhelming margins, bipartisan margins, more than 80 votes in each case, by the Members of this Senate way back on August 1.
These bills are the Agriculture bill, the Agriculture-FDA bill-- Senator Boozman chairs that subcommittee. It includes funding for the SNAP program; for the Women, Infants, and Children nutrition program, known as WIC; for our farmers; for rural development; for our rural communities throughout this country. It is a very important bill--a bill that will take away the worry that families who are low income and seniors who are low income and rely upon the SNAP program or the WIC Program are feeling today about whether the funding is going to be there. That concern goes away with the passage of this full-year appropriations bill that extends until the end of September of next year.
A second bill in this package is the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs bill. That subcommittee is chaired--I have actually mixed up the two subcommittees. Agriculture is chaired by Senator Hoeven, and Military Construction-VA is chaired by Senator Boozman. They are both extraordinary chairmen who work in a bipartisan manner with their ranking minority members and with their House counterparts.
Think about it. Tomorrow is Veterans Day. Wouldn't it be wonderful if tonight the Senate passes the bill that provides yearlong funding through the end of this fiscal year, to September 30 of next year, for our VA? What a way to tell our veterans how much we value their sacrifice and their service--a debt to them that we can never fully repay. It is so important to get that bill through.
Military construction projects--what a difference that makes to our troops all over the world. There are two that matter a great deal to me in the State of Maine, one that will help the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, which I worked on with my fellow Senator from Maine and our two Senators from New Hampshire, and one that will benefit the Air National Guard Base in Bangor, ME, where I live. I am so proud of that base. It does more refuelings than any base on the east coast during wartime, and it is extraordinarily skillful and filled with patriots. They will be taken care of.
The third bill is the Legislative Branch bill. That bill answers concerns that a lot of our Members have about security in this increasingly polarized and difficult environment in which we live. But that is not all, and I want to correct any misimpression that has been given by some who have spoken today on the other side of the aisle.
The Senate majority leader has given a public commitment that he will bring to the Senate floor bills that extend the Affordable Care Act, which, unfortunately, has turned out to be anything but affordable. But it will extend the premium tax credits that allow our lower income and middle-income families to afford their much needed health insurance. In many cases, these are individuals who are self-employed, so they do not get health insurance through the workplace, or they are the employees of small businesses that are unable to provide health insurance, particularly in this time when we are seeing skyrocketing premiums.
So, as I have said from the beginning, I support an extension of the ACA tax credits, but they need reform. It is wrong that wealthy families qualify for taxpayer-subsidized tax credits for their health insurance when they can afford their own health insurance. That was the change in ObamaCare that was made during COVID.
We should take a look at what the original income cap was under the Affordable Care Act. It was 400 percent of the poverty level. Now, we can decide what it should be, but surely we ought to be able to agree in a bipartisan way that there should be some cap on income so that very wealthy individuals are not able to receive taxpayer-funded tax credits. Let's limit that to those who are in middle-income and lower income families.
There are other great ideas that have been raised by our colleagues on how we can reform the ACA to make health insurance more affordable. I know that the chair of the HELP Committee, Senator Cassidy, who is a medical doctor, as well as Chairman Mike Crapo of the Finance Committee have promised to have hearings to take a hard look at this, and we have the commitment of the majority leader to bring these bills to the floor.
So it is just not true that we are ignoring this issue. We do need to act by the end of the year, and that is exactly what the majority leader has promised.
In addition, he has pledged to bring additional, yearlong appropriations bills to the Senate floor. We will be doing that shortly, and that is the right thing to do.
I want to thank the eight Democrats who yesterday stood up for the American people and did what was right: pledged to reopen government; to pass these three appropriations bills that Members of this Chamber passed by over 80 votes on August 1 and which will take away the threat of any kind of shut down for the programs in those three bills.
As I mentioned, the last bill is the Leg Branch bill. I want to thank Senator Markwayne Mullin for his leadership on that bill as well.
We have terrific members on the Appropriations Committee on both sides of the aisle who have worked so hard, and I must say that I think all of them ought to be voting for this package of bills tonight.
I made most of my comments yesterday when I brought these bills to floor. There are others who are seeking recognition, so I will cease my remarks. But I just want to encourage everyone to cast their vote for this package of bills so that we can send it over to our House colleagues, where I hope they will do the same, and then send it to the President, who has already endorsed this package and pledged to sign the bill into law.
Let's end this entirely unnecessary, shameful shutdown.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 2 minutes of debate, equally divided, prior to each rollcall in relation to Calendar No. 168, H.R. 5371.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, all postcloture time is expired.
The question is on agreeing to the motion to proceed.
Mr. President, shortly, I will move to table amendment No. 3947 for the purposes of offering my amendment to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits for 1 year. I am doing this because my Republican colleagues are refusing to act to stop healthcare premiums from doubling for over 20 million Americans.
I just can't stand by without a fight. Americans have said loudly and clearly that they are in a healthcare crisis. That is not up for a negotiation. But it didn't have to be this way. We are at this moment because Donald Trump and congressional Republicans have simply refused to address the biggest increase in insurance premiums they will likely ever experience.
For months, congressional Republicans and Donald Trump have refused to even talk to us about addressing it. Estimates show that 22 million Americans will see their premiums double on average. I am getting calls daily from Wisconsinites begging me to stay in this fight.
A couple in Door County, WI, told me their premium is rising by $550 a month next year. Everything is already too expensive. So where are they supposed to find 6,500 extra dollars in their budget?
Another couple, from Butternut, WI, told me their premiums are going from $400 per month to over $5,000 per month. That is $55,000 more a year. As they wrote to me, ``healthcare tax breaks are not just numbers on paper. They are a lifeline that allows us to sleep at night, knowing that we won't lose everything if one of us gets sick.''
Behind every one of the 22 million Americans who rely on these tax credits is a story, a family who has to put together a budget, who has to make the hard decisions of what they can afford for their family next year. Some are logging on to healthcare.gov right now and finding that they simply can't afford health insurance next year. That is unconscionable.
Addressing this demands that we act now--not in a week, not next month, but now.
That is why a handshake deal with my Republican colleagues to reopen the government and no guarantee to actually lower costs is simply not good enough. The people I work for need more than that. They need healthcare that they can afford, not a symbolic vote.
For over a year now, I have been fighting to get a bill passed to avoid this very situation and make these tax credits permanent. My colleagues and I have tried every which way to get this bill passed. Every time, my Republican colleagues kill the effort and put 22 million Americans on the path to pay more for healthcare next year.
For 41 days, I have been clear. I will work with anyone to reopen the government and lower Americans' healthcare costs. And I am not throwing in the towel until we have exhausted every option to make that happen.
That is why I have offered an amendment to extend tax breaks for Americans who buy their insurance through the Affordable Care Act for 1 year. My amendment is as straightforward as it gets. It would extend current law for 1 year, stop costs from skyrocketing for constituents, and give us time to negotiate on healthcare costs, without leaving 22 million Americans in the lurch.
Is this everything I think we should do? No. We should make healthcare more affordable for everyone forever. But I am willing to compromise to avoid catastrophe for families I work for.
I am demanding that we take this vote so that we can actually provide some relief to millions of American families. The American people are desperate for healthcare that they can afford and demand that we do everything in our power to lower costs. This is a tool in my toolbox to try to lower their costs. So I am using it.
I have talked to so many of my Republican colleagues who want to do something here, who want to keep healthcare costs down for their constituents, who know their constituents in red States and districts will be hardest hit.
Well, now is the time to show it.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
My sincere hope is that the Republicans join me so I can make this amendment to the continuing resolution and let 22 million Americans rest easier. I hope my Republican colleagues choose to join us.
Mr. President, I want to thank the Senator from Wisconsin for offering this important and very simple and straightforward amendment. Nothing can be simpler.
Are you prepared, I say to my Republican friends, to sit back and allow over 20 million Americans to see a doubling of their healthcare premiums?
In my State of Vermont, people who are 65, 63 years of age will, in some cases, see a tripling or quadrupling. And that is the case in your States as well.
All that Senator Baldwin is saying is: Let us take a deep breath. Let us make sure that people do not see an outrageous increase in their premiums. Let us not pave the way for 15 million Americans to lose their healthcare entirely because of savage cuts to Medicaid. That is all she is asking.
Now, I notice that recently, some of my Republican colleagues are beginning to talk about the healthcare crisis. Well, during Trump's first 4 years, he had virtually nothing to say about the crisis, and nothing to say about it in the next 4 years. But I am glad that there is some discussion.
The truth of the matter is, in my view, that the current healthcare system is broken, it is dysfunctional, and it is cruel.
But I want to ask my Republican friends a simple question: Are you happy with the fact that here in the United States, we are the only major country not to guarantee healthcare to every man, woman, and child?
We are unique. That is not the kind of exceptionalism we should be proud of.
Are you happy that we are paying twice as much per capita for healthcare, over $14,000 per person, more than any other major country, and yet we have 85 million Americans who are uninsured or underinsured?
Are you content with the fact that the insurance companies and the drug companies are making huge profits, paying their CEOs exorbitant salaries? Are you happy with that?
Are you happy that patients in America have to get on the phone and fight like crazy and deal with all kinds of bureaucrats in order to get the healthcare that they paid for in an incredibly complicated, broken system?
So if you want to have a debate about healthcare, let's have that debate. I happen to believe that we should join the rest of the industrialized world, guarantee healthcare to all people through a Medicare-for-all, single-payer system.
You got a better idea? Bring it forward. But what we should agree upon is that you don't raise premiums by 100 percent or, in some cases, triple or quadruple.
Let's take a deep breath. Let's extend these ACA subsidies for another
Mr. President, I yield to the Senator from Michigan.
Mr. President, I rise today in support of Ms. Baldwin's amendment on a clean 1-year extension on the healthcare.gov credits.
Since July, I have been really clear. If you want me to vote on a deal, it has got to do something to bring down the cost of healthcare because of the healthcare crisis that Republicans in this Chamber precipitated back in July.
Just to review the bidding, in July, the Big Beautiful Bill, which all of you voted for--most of you voted for--slashed Medicaid and slashed coverage for people on healthcare.gov. Now, all our hospitals, all our healthcare systems, all our nursing homes--everybody--accepted that and started to plan.
In response to that, the hospitals said: Well, look, people are still going to come. They are still going to get into car accidents. They are still going to have heart attacks. They are just not going to be covered by health insurance. So we are going to have to charge the people with insurance even more money.
So we are now at this point. This crisis that has been precipitated has led to the fact that every single American--everyone watching, everyone listening--is either facing losing their health insurance or paying more, and that includes people on private, employer-provided insurance.
When we take a step back and we look at all the people that are going to fall off healthcare, all the healthy young people that are not going to pay for healthcare anymore, it looks like--across, at least, my State--every single person is looking at their prices doubling, not just the people who are affected by the Big Beautiful Bill but the bill payers, the people on private health insurance.
No one in this room would say that we are paying too little for healthcare right now.
And I don't always agree with Senator Sanders, but I can say there is no more broken system in America than healthcare right now. It needs full rebuilding. We may disagree on some of the ways to do it, but the Republicans offered zero plan, zero ideas. Hell, Marjorie Taylor Greene is talking about how Republican don't have a plan. I never thought I would be agreeing with her.
So, today, all we are asking for is a clean 1-year extension. No one says ObamaCare is perfect. No one says a clean extension is perfect.
But you pushed people back into a corner. You have said we are going to pay for our tax cuts on the backs of everyday Americans by using their healthcare as the bill payer.
So can we do a 1-year extension, please, so that we can have some kind of conversation--a real conversation--that the American people expect people of our stature to be having? Can we have that conversation over the next year, but not, in some cases, have people's health insurance go up by 600 percent? That is what you have precipitated.
So to every American watching, whether you are on healthcare.gov or you are on private insurance, if you are getting those letters, if you are getting those notifications of an increase of your bill of $200, $500, $800 starting January 1, my peers on the other side of the aisle are the ones--you should lay it at their feet because they have put us in this place. And if they vote tonight against this, it is because they don't give a crap about the cost of your healthcare. They don't give one single crap about it.
So I hope my colleagues find it in their hearts to say: Let's fix the system, fine. But at least for now, give us a 1-year extension so we can have a real conversation.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. President, I move to table amendment No. 3947 for the purposes of offering my amendment to extend ACA tax credits for 1 year. That is Baldwin No. 3950.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to table.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 53, as follows:
Mr. President, I want to provide an opportunity tonight for us all to stand up for the Constitution, one of the most important powers that we have here as a Congress, and that is the ability to design a program and to fund a program. And once that has been signed into law by a President of the United States, it is the law of the land. The President has the responsibility to execute that program as designed and funded.
But back in 1974, we decided to give the President a fast track to propose that something we have designed and funded should be unfunded. It is called a rescission, a fancy name for us acting to unfund a program we previously had put in place.
And here is the thing, that law, the Budget Act of 1974, says that it takes an affirmative vote of the Senate and of the House of Representatives to unfund the program that is already in law.
But an unexpected challenge has emerged, and that unexpected challenge is that if the request from the President to unfund the program comes within 45 days of the end of the year, even if we were to act and turn down the rescission, it still means that, under a grace period in the law, the funds evaporate at the end of the year. So in other words, with no approval from the House or Senate, no new law being passed, the existing law is undone on the clock. It is like-- well, it is like Cinderella's coach. It reaches midnight, and the coach becomes a pumpkin. It falls apart. It disappears.
That is a threat that goes fundamentally to the difference between a democracy and an autocracy. In a democracy, we come together with all of our varied experiences, with all of our different parts of the country, and we say: Here are programs and funding that fit our Nation as a whole. It is a master compromise. But in an authoritarian government, one person decides what is funded and what isn't. And that is what happens in this special power when it is submitted within 45 days of the end of the fiscal year.
So however much one may like or dislike a given President in power, support or oppose, all of us have a responsibility to stand up for our constitutional power of the purse; that all of America will be served by the laws we pass and that if they are to be undone, they have to be voted on by this Chamber and the Chamber down the hall in an affirmative fashion.
So I will, at the appropriate moment a minute or two from now, propose at that point to table an amendment that is in the tree so we can submit an
Mr. President, I will be happy to give a portion of that equally divided by saying simply this: None of us are well served by a situation where the President decides to cancel programs based on the President's preferences. That is not a democracy.
And whether it is this President or a future President, we need to have these rescission requests submitted in time for us to take action as the law requires.
So submitting them with enough time to spare at the end of the fiscal year for us to vote up or down is the right thing to do. It protects our constitutional power to design and fund programs.
I move to table amendment No. 3946 for the purpose of offering my amendment No. 3948 to defend our constitutional power of the purse and the importance of our democracy in ensuring that what we put into law stays in law unless we choose to change it.
I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The question is on agreeing to the motion to table.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
The result was announced--yeas 47, nays 53, as follows:
Mr. President, instead of a clean CR, this bill contains language that has been air-dropped in that will destroy hemp farming in Kentucky and across the United States.
Tucked away on page 163, title VII, division B of this spending package is a provision that will shut down the hemp industry across the United States. My amendment would strip the provision designed to regulate the hemp industry to death.
The bill as it now stands overrides the regulatory frameworks of several States, cancels the collective decisions of hemp consumers, and destroys the livelihoods of hemp farmers. And it couldn't come at a worse time for America farmers. Times are tough for our farmers. Farmers' costs have increased as the price of fertilizer and machinery have jumped, while prices for their crops, like soybean, corn, and wheat, have declined.
For many farmers, hemp has proved to be a lifeline, a new cash crop. Farmers turn to growing hemp to mitigate the losses they endured during this season of hardship. But that lifeline may soon be extinguished by this very legislation.
The effective hemp ban included in this spending package is a result, we are told, of bad actors skirting the legal limits by overly enhancing the concentration of THC in their products. The hemp industry, myself, and others have come together, and we have been willing to negotiate to get rid of the bad actors. Yet, instead, we are met with legislation that would be prohibition.
Members of the industry, myself, and others who are advocates of this have been willing to get rid of synthetic cannabinoids, willing to compromise at every turn, but we are met with the numbers in this bill, which will eradicate the hemp industry.
For the last several weeks, we have offered proposals with the goal of creating an environment in which the hemp industry could thrive and sell products, and we have been met with those who want to prohibit the industry from continuing.
This bill's per-serving THC content limit would make illegal any hemp product that contains more than 0.4 milligrams. That would be nearly 100 percent of the existing market. The numbers put forward in this bill will eliminate 100 percent of the hemp products in our country. That amounts to an effective ban because the limit is so low that the products intended to manage pain or anxiety will lose their effect.
The States have done what they are supposed to. The States have instituted laws. Twenty-three States have instituted laws on hemp. None of them have limits anywhere close to what is being proposed in this bill. So what will happen is most of the things that your States have regulated, are regulating, and have made legal will be made illegal by this bill. This bill will effectively preempt and nullify all State laws concerning hemp.
Currently, Maine limits THC to 3 milligrams per serving; that will be overruled. My home State limits THC to 5 milligrams in beverages; that will be overruled. Minnesota, Utah, and Louisiana also have 5 milligrams per serving. Alabama and Georgia have 10 milligrams. Tennessee has 15 milligrams. The bill before us nullifies all these State laws and makes the hemp industry kaput.
The language in this bill will outlaw all current hemp plants and seeds. It changes the definition of what a hemp plant is. It makes it so low that there may not even be an existing plant that can meet the parameters. But every plant in the country will have to be destroyed. Every hemp seed in the country will have to be destroyed. This is the most thoughtless, ignorant proposal to an industry that I have seen in a long, long time.
The States have made progress, and more progress is coming. Most States have age limits.
To add insult to injury, we are given this legislation in an appropriations bill. We have Senate rules against this.
So I would recommend that we vote for this amendment, and my amendment would strip out the language.
I would transfer the remainder of my time to Senator Merkley.
I really ask my colleagues, particularly on this side, to hear me out on this.
The Senators from Kentucky and Oregon cooperated to create the first research on hemp. We cooperated to give the first opportunity to move research seeds across State lines. We cooperated and pushed to create hemp as a legitimate agricultural product.
CBD derived from hemp has been approved by the FDA for treating seizures. It is a legal medicine. We would wipe out an industry that we have spent more than a decade creating.
The advocates for this language that is in the bill will tell you this won't affect CBD. Every expert I have consulted has said that that is exactly wrong; that this will, in fact, wipe out 95 to 99 percent of the industry.
My colleague from Kentucky is exactly right. We asked our farmers to engage in this research, and we asked them to build this industry. We should protect it for CBD.
I support my other colleague from Kentucky, who doesn't want intoxicated products produced from hemp. The definition that is in this bill does far more than that, and it has to be fixed. So, for now, it needs to be stripped out.
Mr. President, the language I helped secure in the Agriculture appropriations bill addresses a serious concern regarding the manufacturing and selling of unregulated, intoxicating THC products nationwide.
I led the effort to legalize industrial hemp through the 2014 pilot program and the 2018 farm bill. Unfortunately, companies have exploited a loophole in the 2018 legislation by taking legal amounts of THC from hemp and turning it into intoxicating substances and then marketing it to children in candylike packaging and selling it in easily accessible places like gas stations and convenience stores all across our country. So the children end up being the unknowing consumers of these poisonous products and being sent to the hospital at an alarming rate.
My efforts to close this loophole and stop this from happening are included in this appropriations package. It will keep these dangerous products out of the hands of children while preserving the hemp industry for farmers. Industrial hemp and CBD will remain legal for industrial applications--such as seed, stock, fiber, grain oil--or will be used in drug trials. This language merely clarifies the original intent of the 2018 farm bill, rooting out the bad actors and protecting the growing hemp industry.
While some may masquerade as advocates for hemp farmers, even sometimes threatening to hold up government funding over this issue, I will continue to work on behalf of Kentucky's farmers while protecting our children not only in my State but in yours as well. I would urge my colleagues to do the same.
Therefore, I move to table Senate amendment No. 3941, and I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to table.
Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The result was announced--yeas 76, nays 24, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the mandatory quorum call under rule XXII has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on amendment No. 3937 to Calendar No. 168, H.R. 5371, a bill making continuing appropriations and extensions for fiscal year 2026, and for other purposes, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 60, nays 40, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 60, the nays are 40.
Three-fifths of the Senators, duly chosen and sworn, having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Cloture having been invoked, the motion to commit and the amendments pending thereto fall.
Under the previous order, the pending amendments, other than the substitute amendment No. 3937, are withdrawn and all postcloture time is expired.
The amendments were withdrawn.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question occurs on the substitute amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on Calendar No. 168, H.R. 5371, a bill making continuing appropriations and extensions for fiscal year 2026,
On page S8130, November 10, 2025, first column, the following appears: The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on Calendar No. 163, H.R. 5371, a bill making continuing appropriations and extensions for fiscal year 2026
The online Record has been corrected to read: The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on Calendar No. 168, H.R. 5371, a bill making continuing appropriations and extensions for fiscal year 2026
and for other purposes, as amended, shall be brought to a close.The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 60, nays 40, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 60, the nays are 40.
Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
Mr. President, I want to thank all of our colleagues for their hard work on this bill. I am excited about its impending passage. I hope that will mean that we will immediately reopen government as soon as the House acts and the President signs it into law.
I am also very pleased that we were able to fully fund three appropriations bills that passed with overwhelming bipartisan support on August 1.
I thank my colleagues. I know of no other requests for time.
I yield back the remaining time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the clerk will read the bill by title 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 pass?
Mr. President, I just want to reiterate my gratitude for my colleagues, our staff who report night and day, literally, and to all of those who have brought us to this point.
We are going to reopen government. We are going to ensure that Federal employees, whether they were furloughed or laid off or forced to work without pay, will now receive compensation that they have earned and deserve.
And we will also be able to celebrate on Veterans Day tomorrow the fact that we have passed the appropriations bill for the VA.
This would not have come about without the work of so many people-- too numerous to mention. But I do want to thank my fellow appropriators, particularly the chairs of the three committees--Senator Boozman, Senator Hoeven, and Senator Mullin--for their hard work.
I want to thank our House counterparts, particularly Chairman Cole, who worked night and day with us on getting conference agreements.
And our Democratic colleagues who courageously realized that we could not let this shutdown continue to go on with the harmful consequences growing worse with each passing day.
I also want to particularly thank my staff. They literally went without sleep and worked continuously to do all that needed to be done.
I want to thank Leader Thune and Leader Barrasso for their hard work and the work of their staff as well.
My list of gratitude could go on and on, but the hour is getting late, and I do want people to be able to go home for the night and home-home, finally.
Again, I think this is a great victory for the American people. It shows that the Senate can work; that we can produce the results that are needed.
I want to give a shout-out to Senator Katie Britt, who is here this evening--
So thank you, Mr. President, for all that has been done and for your personal participation as well.
Mr. President, this has been a very long road--quite literally, the longest shutdown in history. I am very, very happy to be able to say that we are coming to the end.
Before we close today, I want to take the time to say thank you to my staff, who have worked around the clock tirelessly now for the past 6 weeks; to the staff of the Appropriations Committee, who have played a critical role in getting us to where we are today; to the Cloakroom staff; to every Senate staffer on both sides of the aisle, who has spent 41 days coming into work without pay; to the custodial staff, who, again without pay, have kept this building and the Senate office buildings livable; to all institutional staff, without whom this place would not run; to the Secretary of the Senate and everyone in her office; the Sergeant at Arms and her team; the Architect of the Capitol and his staff; and everyone on the floor right now making this session happen; and to the men and women of the U.S. Capitol Police, who have shown up during this shutdown day in and day out to protect the rest of us. I am humbled by and grateful for your service.
I know that the strain of these weeks has been immense, and you all have families, rent to meet, bills to pay, car and mortgage payments. I am grateful for all you have done to keep the Senate running and for all that you do every day, shutdown or no shutdown, to serve the Senate and to serve our country.
With that, after 6 excruciating weeks, I will stop talking and let all of you get some rest.
Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 515.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the nomination.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of Ho Nieh, of Alabama, to be a Member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the remainder of the term expiring June 30, 2029.
Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 464.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the nomination.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of Donald Korb, of Ohio, to be Chief Counsel for the Internal Revenue Service and an Assistant General Counsel in the Department of the Treasury.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, today I voted yes on the motion to table Senator Paul's amendment No. 3941 to strike a provision modifying the definition of hemp from the Agriculture Appropriations Act because I am concerned that existing Federal law creates the opportunity for unregulated and intoxicating synthetic hemp products to be marketed and sold to children. Current Maryland law bans these products, but without Federal action, they can still be distributed in our State. The language in the underlying bill would close that loophole while the Paul amendment would leave the loophole in place.
While I support closing the loophole that allows these intoxicating products to be marketed and sold to children, we should use the implementation period in the bill to ensure a sustainable pathway forward for safe hemp products like CBD, which many people depend on to safely manage pain and other health conditions. We ultimately need balanced, science-based regulation that preserves access to safe products while protecting public health.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that all Members of the Republican conference be authorized to sign duly enrolled bills or joint resolutions from November 11 through November 18.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The resolution (S. Res. 497) was agreed to.
(The resolution is printed in today's Record under ``Submitted Resolutions.'')
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate now proceed to the en bloc consideration of the following resolutions, which are at the desk: S. Res. 494, S. Res. 495, S. Res. 496, and S. Res. 498.
There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the resolutions en bloc.
I ask unanimous consent that the resolutions be agreed to, the preambles be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, all en bloc.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The resolutions were agreed to.
The preambles were agreed to.
(The resolutions, with their preambles, are printed in today's Record under ``Submitted Resolutions.'')
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn to then convene for pro forma session only, with no business being conducted, on the following dates and times: Thursday, November 13, at 6:30 p.m., and Monday, November 17, at 3 p.m.; further, that when the Senate adjourns on Monday, November 17, it stand adjourned until 3 p.m. on Tuesday, November 18; that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each; finally, that notwithstanding rule XXII, the cloture motions filed today ripen at 5:30 p.m.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
