[Pages S7665-S7675]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

TRADE ACT OF 2015

The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the
Senate will resume consideration of the House message to accompany H.R.
1314, which the clerk will report.
The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

House message to accompany H.R. 1314, an act to amend the
Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide for a right to an
administrative appeal relating to adverse determinations of
tax-exempt status of certain organizations.

Pending:

McConnell motion to concur in the amendment of the House of
Representatives to the amendment of the Senate to the bill.
McConnell motion to concur in the amendment of the House of
Representatives to the amendment of the Senate to the bill,
with McConnell amendment No. 2750, to change the enactment
date.
McConnell amendment No. 2751 (to amendment No. 2750), of a
perfecting nature.
McConnell motion to refer the amendment of the House of
Representatives to the amendment of the Senate to the bill,
to the Committee on Finance, with instructions, McConnell
amendment No. 2752, to change the enactment date.
McConnell amendment No. 2753 (to (the instructions)
amendment No. 2752), of a perfecting nature.
McConnell amendment No. 2754 (to amendment No. 2753), of a
perfecting nature.

The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the time
until 1:01 a.m. will be equally divided between the two leaders or
their designees.
The Senator from Texas.
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to waive the
mandatory quorum call with respect to the motion to concur in the House
message to accompany H.R. 1314.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Illinois.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, earlier this week the White House and
congressional leadership announced a budget deal that will avert a
potential shutdown of the Federal Government and prevent a default on
our country's obligations. This agreement would provide relief to the
arbitrary sequester

[[Page S7666]]

caps for 2 years and maintain the full faith and credit of the United
States by extending the debt limit to March 2017.
For months we have been calling on both sides to abandon any reckless
budget cuts and work together to give the American people much needed
relief from the sequester. I applaud President Obama and the leaders
from both political parties for crafting a commonsense solution that
protects the American people and our economic recovery.
This measure passed the House of Representatives, and now it is our
turn. This agreement calls for $112 billion in sequester relief,
providing necessary funding for critical programs on which many
Americans depend. With this additional funding, dramatic cuts in these
programs can be avoided.
Yesterday I spoke about the importance of biomedical research.
Funding for the National Institutes of Health can lead to medical
breakthroughs that keep us healthier and save money in the long run.
One illustration: One American is diagnosed with Alzheimer's every 67
seconds in America, and $1 out of every $5 spent in the Medicare system
is spent for those suffering from Alzheimer's and dementia. The numbers
are growing, the cost is growing, and the research is imperative. If we
can find a way to delay the onset of Alzheimer's, treat it, cure it,
for goodness' sake, it not only will spare human suffering, but it will
save our budget. So is money for medical research well spent? Of
course. Yet in past years we have shortchanged it in the name of budget
relief.
Well, this is a moment where we can keep our promise to the NIH, to
the CDC, and many other agencies that are responsible for medical
research. Thanks to bipartisan support--and I especially note the
Senator from Missouri, Roy Blunt, as well as the Senator from
Washington, Patty Murray--we are going to see an increase in the Senate
bill this year for NIH if the Senate number continues, and I hope that
it does. But it shouldn't come at the expense of other programs, such
as the Centers for Disease Control, which faces cuts in our version of
the bill and receives better treatment in the House. We can't be the
world leader in biomedical research by cutting funding for NIH or CDC.
We should also restore funding for community health centers and
substance abuse and mental health programs. As I travel around the
State of Illinois, our State, like most States, is facing a heroin
epidemic. We find that the overdoses and deaths associated with heroin
are now striking a part of our population that they never struck
before. The prevalence of death from heroin in America in the last 15
years has changed dramatically, and now most of the victims are White,
between the ages of 18 and 44. And that means we have to do something
about it, not only in policing--which is, of course, our
responsibility--but also when it comes to treatment for those who are
addicted. We can't cut back in substance abuse and mental health
programs without paying a heavy price and inviting more human
suffering.
We need to ensure that the FDA has the funding to fully implement the
Food Safety Modernization Act.
The money in this budget agreement will help us reach these goals and
many others. We can work together to chip away at the $850 million
underinvestment in programs that help our veterans, ensuring that those
who put their lives on the line for America are given the care, the
respect, and the quality education they deserve.
We should use some of the sequester relief in the budget deal to fund
transit programs and transportation, if necessary. I am proud to
represent the city of Chicago. Our mass transit is essential. We, of
course, stand by our infrastructure as well when it comes to highways,
bridges, and rail service, but it is important that our mass transit
systems across America be maintained.
The core capacity and TIGER grants--popular grant programs that have
benefited the entire Nation--were facing cuts in early versions of
bills. We can reverse it.
Senate Republicans funded the HOME Program, which is $66 million.
That was a 93-percent reduction in funding for this essential housing
program. We can start to restore money in that area.
Without the sequester relief provided in the budget deal, $770
million would be cut from America's schools. Who in the world thinks
that cutting spending on education is the best thing for America in the
21st century? We don't want to eliminate critical title I funding for
the most vulnerable kids in America. In my home State of Illinois
alone, that amounts to a cut of about $40 million if we stuck with the
original budget figures. Now, with this agreement, we could provide
more money for education for the most vulnerable kids.
This agreement also protects our seniors by preventing Medicare Part
B premium increases and deep cuts to Social Security disability
insurance that were scheduled to occur next year. It also extends SSDI
solvency to 2022 and prevents a 20-percent across-the-board cut in
disability benefits.
The idea of sequester relief is not a new one. A similar agreement to
the one we are voting on this morning was reached in 2013 between
Senator Patty Murray and then-Congressman Paul Ryan, who yesterday was
sworn in as the new Speaker of the House. That had widespread
bipartisan support. This should as well. It was the right thing to do
then, and it is the right thing to do now.
Government by manufactured crisis is no way to do the American
people's business. After months of uncertainty, we have before us a
plan to remove the seemingly constant threat of defaults and shutdowns.
The new Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, was very candid yesterday in
acknowledging the broken system in the U.S. House of Representatives,
and I think he could point to our side of the Rotunda as well, which
has a desperate need for more bipartisan solutions. Our work is not
done even with this agreement.
I encourage my colleagues to continue in the spirit of compromise and
a shared goal of growing our American economy and providing fairness to
American citizens. Let's pass appropriations bills free of ideological
policy riders that seek to divide us.
I look forward to joining my colleagues on both sides of the aisle in
passing this bill. Let's get back to work and face the critical issues
which American families face every single day.
I yield the floor.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, yesterday Chairman Hatch and I began
managing this legislation on the floor of this distinguished body. It
seems to me that speaking for more than a couple of minutes at this
point would just be excessive, but I think I want to summarize what the
central question is at this late hour.
It would be fair to say that we have spirited debates in the Senate,
and fiscal battles that play out in this Chamber take place at
virtually every new cycle and certainly with every election. That is as
it should be. That ensures that we have vigorous debate about important
issues the Founding Fathers wanted this Senate to be part of. But that
must never endanger the sterling economic reputation our country has
built over the generations, and passing this legislation, in my view,
helps to preserve that reputation.
With this bipartisan legislation, it is possible to avert a
catastrophic default and a mindless sequester, which would give an
opportunity that the President, the Senate, and I care a great deal
about, and that would be the opportunity to come up with smart,
effective, targeted reforms, such as fixing the broken system of
fighting wildfires in our country. That system is broken today. With
this legislation and the opportunity to bring a bit more flexibility to
the cause of reforming our government, there will be an opportunity on
a bipartisan basis to fix that broken policy which has consumed,
literally and figuratively, so much of our land in the West.
To me, having the opportunity to prevent a government shutdown and
demonstrate once more that our country pays its debts and pays them on
time is central to our obligations in the Senate--obligations we must
meet on a bipartisan basis.
The reality is, as it has been for decades, that America is the
economic rock in tumultuous seas with this legislation. Once again, we
preserve our status, our prestige, with the ability to

[[Page S7667]]

say to the world: America pays its debts. Our full faith and credit is
intact.
The reality is the cycle of fiscal crisis has gone on for far too
long. To me, the Senate ought to view this legislation as, in effect, a
springboard to go back to very different and robust and bipartisan
budget debates. The people of this country--certainly the people of my
State--expect Senators on both sides of the aisle and of differing
philosophies to come together to solve the big economic challenges
ahead.
The reality is, if you count the votes here in the Senate, to get the
important work done, you have to find some common ground. Neither side
can forge the progress we need here in this body all by itself. So
let's pass this bipartisan legislation tonight, and let's reaffirm our
pledge to protect the full faith and credit of the United States.
This evening I urge my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans alike,
to support this important legislation.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Will the Senator delay his
suggestion?
Mr. WYDEN. Yes. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time
during the quorum call be allocated equally.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. WYDEN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, the number one threat to our country's
future is our debt. The number one threat to our national security is
our debt. This deal gives the President the power to borrow unlimited
amounts of money. This deal represents the worst of Washington culture.
The left and the right have come together in an unholy alliance to
explode the debt. The left gets more welfare, the right gets more
military contracts, and the taxpayer is stuck with the deal.
This is a bipartisan busting of the budget caps that will further
indenture our next generation. I promised the voters of Kentucky to
oppose deficits, to oppose budgets that don't balance, and to spend
only that which comes in. I will not give this President any power to
borrow unspecified amounts of money. Our debt now equals our entire
economy. Not raising the debt ceiling means we would be forced to only
spend what comes in--also known as a balanced budget. I could accept
that. But I can also accept a balanced budget that brings us to balance
over 5 years. The debt threatens us like never before, and now is the
time to take a stand. I have traveled far and wide across America. I
have not met one voter outside of DC who supports adding an unlimited
increase to the debt ceiling.
I hope my colleagues will listen and will listen very clearly to
their constituents before voting for this terrible, rotten, no-good
deal. The time is now to take a stand. The time is now to say enough is
enough--no more debt. The very foundation of our country is threatened
by the addition of debt. This is precisely the time when we should be
using the leverage of raising the debt ceiling to exact budgetary
reforms.
In 2011, that is exactly what we did. We had a compromise that worked
in the right direction. We had a compromise that said we will set
limits on both the military and the domestic spending. Instead, what we
have today is an unholy alliance of right and left. We wonder why the
deficit grows no matter which party is involved, no matter which party
is in charge. The deficit continues to grow because, frankly, many are
not serious about reducing the debt. Many up here are serious only
about increasing spending for their sacred cow.
The true compromise that is necessary in America is for both right
and left to say enough is enough, to say that the particular interests
they have in spending money is hurting the country. It is time for the
right to say: You know what; the country is not stronger by going
further in debt. The country actually, I believe, is weaker. We do not
project power from bankruptcy court.
I think the time is now. Enough is enough. We shouldn't be adding
more debt. The left needs to acknowledge this as well. The left may say
this is for humanitarian purposes, we want to help people. I don't
doubt their motives, but I do doubt whether you can help people from
bankruptcy court. I think we are weakening our country.
One of the reasons why we have been able to help so many people in
our country is that we are the richest, most humanitarian country in
the history of mankind. In the year 2014 alone, we gave away nearly
$400 billion in private charity in this country. I fear that will not
continue to last. I fear that as this deficit mounts, as the debt
mounts, they will drag us down.
Already some economists estimate that we are losing a million jobs a
year because of the burden of debt. I think what we need to do is to
have compromise in Washington, but the compromise needs to be that the
right and the left need to say we don't have enough money at this
point. Some say we need to have military readiness. But this week in
the Armed Services Committee, they talked about $20 billion of waste in
one program within the military. We have had Secretaries of the Cabinet
Departments and a Secretary of the Navy saying: You know what; we can
save money within the Pentagon. But if we keep adding to the top line,
if we keep adding more money, if we keep spending good money after bad,
we are going to bankrupt the country.
I hope my colleagues will listen to their constituents, because I
have been in 40 of the 50 States and I have yet to meet a single voter
who says: Keep adding to the debt; keep spending more money.
What I find is the opposite. They say: Work together to save the
country. Work together not to add more debt.
This debt ceiling vote does something that is unprecedented. It
doesn't even add a certain amount to the debt. It adds an unspecified
amount. Over the next year or year and a half, we will add as much debt
as can be crammed into the budget, as much money as can be spent. There
will be no limit. We are giving an unspecified amount of borrowing
power to the President. I don't care whether it is a Democratic
President or a Republican President. It is unconscionable to give
unlimited borrowing authority to the President.
As we contemplate this decision, we need to think beyond the short
term. We need to think beyond the short term of self-constituencies on
either side of the aisle and say enough is enough. We don't have the
money. Let's take a stand now and try to reform the process before it
is too late.
Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I want to once again express my support for
the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 and urge my colleagues to vote in
favor of invoking cloture on this legislation.
As I have said before, this is not a perfect bill, and I haven't
heard anyone argue that it is. Indeed, any Senator looking for a reason
to vote against this budget deal could easily find one.
However, at the same time, this bill will accomplish a number of
important tasks and clear a number of hurdles out of our way to allow
us to govern more effectively in the coming months.
For example, the bill will suspend the statutory debt limit through
mid-March of 2017, eliminating the threat of an immediate default and
ensuring that conflicts over the debt limit do not get swept up in the
politicking and pandering of next year's election campaign.
This bill will also extend the life of the Social Security Disability
Insurance--or SSDI--trust fund for an additional 6 years, preventing
massive benefit cuts to disabled American workers and removing the
current uncertainty. It actually goes further than that, putting in
place SSDI reforms that are the most significant changes to any Social
Security program in more than 30 years--not an insignificant
accomplishment.
In addition, this legislation will prevent millions from seeing huge
premium hikes in the Medicare Part B Program, again ensuring that our
seniors don't suffer as a result of political

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gridlock and grandstanding in Congress.
And it will repeal an unpopular and obviously ineffective provision
from the so-called Affordable Care Act: the employer auto-enrollment
requirement.
Finally, the bill will partially lift the budget caps established
under the Budget Control Act. And, while I share my colleague's
concerns about rolling back real spending cuts, I think that it is
important to note that the bill does not add to the debt, nor does it
raise taxes. Even more important is the fact that it will increase
funding for our military at a time when we face so many challenges and
potential conflicts in the world.
As I said earlier in this debate, sometimes--many times, in fact--
governing effectively is about the art of the doable. While neither the
substance of this bill nor the process that got us here are ideal for
anyone, we need to take a close look at where we are and, more
importantly, where we want to be in the near future.
I won't speak for anyone else, but I personally would rather focus on
substantive, long-term solutions to the problems plaguing our country
than spending so much time navigating from crisis to crisis. Meaningful
and lasting policies are very rarely crafted or enacted when we are
speeding toward a cliff, and this bill would eliminate a number of
cliffs in our very near future and give us a real chance to do more
good for the American people.
Therefore, in addition to voting to move this bill forward, I want to
call on my colleagues on both sides of the aisle--particularly those
who have real reservations about the legislation before us today--to
work with me on these issues. I currently chair the Senate committee
with jurisdiction over many of these areas, and I have been working for
a number of years to address these problems.
I want to reform our entitlement programs in order to put our debt on
a sustainable trajectory.
I want to put in place fundamental, long-term fixes for the SSDI
program and Social Security more generally.
And I want to work to get long-term spending under control.
I know many of my colleagues share these desires, and nothing in this
bill prevents us from doing more work to get us where so many of us
want to be. I am willing to work with anyone--Republican or Democrat--
to get us there.
But it will be extremely difficult to do any of this with ticking
clocks hanging over our heads. That is why, once again, I urge my
colleagues to vote to move this bill forward.
This bill has been an important undertaking. And I know that many of
our leaders are taking no small amount of criticism for the work they
have done to put it together. I want to thank them for their efforts
and particularly for their willingness to set aside partisanship and
political expedience to do what needs to be done.
Most notably, I want to thank Speaker Boehner for his efforts in
crafting this compromise and getting it across the finish line. He had
a difficult road over in the House of Representatives--being Speaker of
the House is never an easy job. Even if you disagreed with Speaker
Boehner, which I did from time to time, you could never doubt his
commitment to the people he represented in Congress and his courage to
always do what he believed was the right thing for the American people.
While I have every confidence in the new Speaker of the House--
Speaker Ryan and I have worked well together on a number of issues, and
I think we can all acknowledge that he is an effective leader--I have
to say that Speaker Boehner will be missed.
I also have to once again thank our distinguished majority leader
here in the Senate. He also has a difficult job and is no less willing
to take a lot of heat and put up with a lot of criticism in order to do
the right thing. Under Senator McConnell's leadership, the Senate is
finally a functioning body where things actually get done. Things
haven't gone perfectly--they never do--but, I expect that, as time goes
on, things will continue to get better.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Who yields time?
If no one yields time, the time will be charged equally to both
sides.

Cloture Motion

The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. 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:

Cloture Motion

We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the
provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate,
do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to
concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to
accompany H.R. 1314, a bill to amend the Internal Revenue
Code of 1986 to provide for a right to an administrative
appeal relating to adverse determinations of tax-exempt
status of certain organizations.
Mitch McConnell, John Cornyn, Lisa Murkowski, John Thune,
Lamar Alexander, John Barrasso, Roger F. Wicker, Orrin
G. Hatch, John McCain, Thad Cochran, Thom Tillis,
Michael B. Enzi, Mike Rounds, Roy Blunt, Susan M.
Collins, Shelley Moore Capito.

The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. By unanimous consent, the mandatory
quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the
motion to concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to H.R.
1314 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.
Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator
from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Murphy)
is necessarily absent.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Are there any other Senators in the
Chamber desiring to vote?
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 63, nays 35, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 292 Leg.]

YEAS--63

Alexander
Ayotte
Baldwin
Barrasso
Bennet
Blumenthal
Booker
Boxer
Brown
Cantwell
Capito
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Cochran
Collins
Coons
Cornyn
Donnelly
Durbin
Feinstein
Franken
Gillibrand
Graham
Hatch
Heinrich
Heitkamp
Hirono
Kaine
King
Kirk
Klobuchar
Leahy
Manchin
Markey
McCain
McCaskill
McConnell
Menendez
Merkley
Mikulski
Murkowski
Murray
Nelson
Peters
Reed
Reid
Roberts
Rounds
Sanders
Schatz
Schumer
Shaheen
Stabenow
Tester
Thune
Tillis
Udall
Warner
Warren
Whitehouse
Wicker
Wyden

NAYS--35

Blunt
Boozman
Burr
Cassidy
Coats
Corker
Cotton
Crapo
Cruz
Daines
Enzi
Ernst
Fischer
Flake
Gardner
Grassley
Heller
Hoeven
Inhofe
Isakson
Johnson
Lankford
Lee
Moran
Paul
Perdue
Portman
Risch
Rubio
Sasse
Scott
Sessions
Shelby
Sullivan
Toomey

NOT VOTING--2

Murphy
Vitter
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. On this vote, the yeas are 63, the
nays are 35.
Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
Cloture having been invoked, the motion to refer falls.
The Senator from Kentucky.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, could we have order.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senate will be in order.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, the No. 1 threat to our country's future is
our debt. The No. 1 threat to our national security is our debt. When
Admiral Mullen was asked about the debt in the recent past, he said
that it is indeed the debt that is the No. 1 threat to our national
security.
This deal gives the President the power to borrow unlimited amounts
of money. This is extraordinary in the sense that we are not to specify
how much money the President can borrow; we are to allow the President
to borrow unlimited amounts of money.
This deal represents the worst of Washington culture. One of the
colloquial ways of putting this is guns and butter. What this deal does
is allow one side to have more guns and one side to have more butter.
It is the old proverbial guns and butter that is bankrupting this
country.
Often people want to point fingers in Washington and out in the
campaign hustings and they want to say, well, it is Democrats' fault or
it is Republicans' fault. What this bill shows is it

[[Page S7669]]

is really the fault of both parties. There is an unholy alliance in
Washington between right and left, frankly, and it is the guns and
butter caucus. On the right they say we need more money for military.
On the left they say we need more money for welfare. So they get
together, there is a secret handshake, we spend more money on
everything, and the country is going bankrupt as a consequence.
We borrow $1 million every minute. This threatens the very foundation
of our country. If we ask people--and I think if we ask people
throughout America, Republican, Democrat, or Independent--if we ask
them whether or not it is a good idea to continue to borrow money
without reforming what we do, to continue borrowing money at an
alarming rate, they would say enough is enough; we should spend only
what comes in.
Now, some have said we shouldn't negotiate over something like
raising the debt ceiling, that it might potentially cost us our bond
rating. But the interesting thing is that in 2011 when we had this
discussion, what we found was that actually our bond rating went down,
and the S&P bond rating agency said that it went down because we failed
to enact meaningful budgetary reform.
Mr. President, could we have order.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senate will be in order.
Mr. PAUL. Often people wonder why the deficit gets worse, either
under Republicans or under Democrats. Under the previous Republican
administration, the debt doubled. It went from $5 trillion to $10
trillion. Under this administration, it will go from $10 trillion to
about $20 trillion, although we don't know the exact number because we
are now letting the President borrow an unspecified amount of money.
But we are on target to add more debt under this President than all of
the previous Presidents combined.
People ask: Why does this go on? Where are the fiscal conservatives?
I guess I would maintain that there are very few fiscal conservatives
on either side of the aisle. Both sides of the aisle have what I would
call sacred cows. On the right they have the sacred cow of military
contracts. And then the interesting thing is they say: We don't have
enough money to properly defend the country. But the interesting thing
is that when you look at military spending, we actually spend more on
our military than the next 10 countries combined. Think about it.
Russia, China, and eight more countries--add up all of their military
spending, and it still doesn't equal what we spend on the military.

Since 9/11 we have increased our military spending by 50 percent. How
do we do that? How do we get the money for the military? It only
happens by a compromise with the other side. The other side will
sometimes resist excessive spending in the military, but they say: You
know what; we will give it to you if you give us what we want. So the
left wants more domestic spending; the left wants more welfare. The
right wants more military spending. So what is the unholy alliance?
What is the great compromise? This is being touted as a bipartisan
compromise. Well, it is a bipartisan busting of the budget caps. It is
a bipartisan compromise that is ruining the country.
The No. 1 threat to our national security is the debt. So for those
who say that we just need more military spending and somehow we will be
safer, I think we are actually becoming less safe as we get further and
further mired in debt. We need to seek something like the opposite of
this compromise. We could have compromise, but I think the compromise
would be that the right acknowledges that we don't have an unlimited
treasury and that we actually are making the country weaker by
hollowing the country from the inside out through this massive debt
that we are accumulating.
I don't think you project power from bankruptcy court. To the left, I
would say: If your goal is humanitarian, if your goal is to help people
who are in need, if your goal is to help the poor and help those who
can't help themselves, we are doing a disservice to the country if we
are going further into bankruptcy to do so. We have to understand what
the contrast is.
We have to understand the contrast between our country and other
countries. One of the great contrasts and one of the things about
America that allows us to be the most humanitarian nation probably in
the history of man is this engine of capitalism. The engine of
capitalism, however, I think, is being brought down. The engine of
capitalism is being burdened by this enormous anchor of debt.
I think we really should be concerned about whether we can continue
to do the things we do to help our fellow man if we are burdened by
this debt. So I think both the right and the left mistake their purpose
here in the short run by saying: Well, we are going to get what we
want--more money, more money, more money. Frankly, we don't have any
money. We are borrowing money at $1 million every minute.
There has been much discussion as I traveled around the country.
There has been much discussion about education. People say they want
free education for everyone. They say we should just give education to
everyone. Well, the interesting thing is this: Do you know to whom we
give free education? We give $15 million of free education to foreign
students just for community college. The things that go and riddle
through the government of what we are spending money on and the reason
we never get reform is because we are doing this unholy compromise when
we are not going through item after item after item of waste.
I will give you a couple of examples of the waste that exists in
government. We spent $800,000 last year in Afghanistan on a televised
cricket league--a televised cricket league for Afghanistan, $800,000.
They don't even have televisions in Afghanistan. Why does this go on?
Why are we never able to fix any of these problems? Because of the
unholy compromise between the right and left that skirts these issues
and continues to blithely go on.
We do not self-examine what is wrong with government because we
bundle government into one large continuing resolution in which there
is no self-examination of waste.
We spent $150,000 on yoga classes for Federal employees. We spent
$200,000 last year studying whether Japanese quail are more sexually
promiscuous when they are on cocaine. The American public is outraged
at the waste.
Even within the Defense Department we have had hearings just this
week that said we wasted $20 billion on one program. This program is
called Future Combat Systems. So we waste money, but nobody is fixing
it. The American people are asking themselves: Why does it go on? Why
is there never any reform? Why? Because there is an unholy alliance
between the right and the left. Everybody gets what they want. The
right will get more military money, and the left will get more welfare
money--guns and butter in abundance. Who gets stuck with the bill? The
taxpayer. The taxpayer is stuck and burdened with the bill, and we have
made our future generations indentured servants. We are making the next
generation bear the burden of our profligate ways, and there is no
sustained force to say enough is enough.
When we look at waste in the military, former Secretary of the Navy
John Lehman, who was the youngest Secretary of the Navy under Reagan,
has said that he believes we do need to modernize our navy. He thinks
we do need more ships. But he also says we should pay for it by
reducing the costs in the Pentagon by reducing the bureaucracy in the
Pentagon. When John Lehman was Secretary of the Navy there were seven
joint task forces. There are now 250 joint task forces.
But here is what I would ask you: We have this program about which we
pointed this out last week called Future Combat Systems--$20 billion
worth of waste in the Pentagon. Do you think it is going to get fixed
if we raise the level of money we spend? The only way waste is ever
ferreted out is if we lower the amount. If you lower the top line
number, if you lower the amount of money that is given, waste will have
to be ferreted out. In fact, what we need are the constraints of the
marketplace that ferret out waste within the private marketplace.
The opposite happens in government. When you look at government
spending and you look at it department by department, what really
happens is the opposite. As each department gets to the end of their
fiscal year, what do they do with the remaining money? They spend it.
They try to spend their money at the end so they will get it the next
year.

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I proposed a budgetary reform which wouldn't fix the entire
government, but it would actually do something I think to lead us in
the right direction. I proposed legislation that I think actually would
help to right some of the problems and try to have correct incentives
in the way we spend our money, both on the military side as well as on
the domestic side. I would give all Federal employees bonuses based on
cost savings. When the American people read about the waste throughout
government, they say: How come it never gets better? Do you want to
know why Congress has a 10-percent approval rating? Because you guys
just raise all the money. You blithely go on, rubberstamp, and give the
money. We have to go for the weekend. But there are ways that we could
reform this. If you gave bonuses to Federal employees for finding
savings, then you would have the correct incentive--the same kind of
incentive that you have in private business, which tries to maximize
profit by reducing costs.
In government, though, you never get that. In the government people
keep spending their money and spending their money. In fact, what we
discovered is that as the fiscal year comes to a close, spending
accelerates and multiplies. People spend more money in the last month
than they spend in the other 11 months. They spend more money in the
last week than they spend in the early weeks. They spend more money in
the last day of the fiscal year than on any other day of the year. In
fact, as the sun rises and as the sun sets, you can watch the spending
accelerate on the last day of the fiscal year. As 5 o'clock approaches
in the East, there is a fury to spend money. As the sun continues into
the West and to Federal agencies in California, they are spending it
like crazy as 5 p.m. approaches.
Why don't we fix any of these problems? We don't fix them because we
have become a rubberstamp and we give everybody what they want. The
right gets their money for guns, the left for butter. Guns and butter
are bankrupting the country.
What we really need are fiscal conservatives. You can be liberal and
be a fiscal conservative. You can be conservative and be a fiscal
conservative. But the problem we have now is that there are people on
the right who are actually liberal with military spending. I don't
think you can be a fiscal conservative if you are for unlimited
spending for the military.
If you look at what we are spending on the Pentagon, if you look at
what we are spending on military spending, we spend more than all the
next 10 countries combined. We have increased our defense spending by
50 percent. Perhaps we should look at the amount spent and try to
ferret out waste and try to figure out what is working and what is not
working. While we are doing it, we should think--and we should think
long and hard--about whether or not we want to get back involved with
another war in Iraq.
The first war in Iraq cost us $1 trillion. In Afghanistan we have now
spent more than the entire Marshall Plan. We don't have a lot to show
for it. Many of the things that have been built in Afghanistan have
been wasted. Much money has been stolen. There are stories repeatedly
of the Karzai family being involved in drugs and drug running and money
being wasted and squandered.
We have to decide this: What is our mission currently in Afghanistan?
What is the purpose of our mission in Afghanistan? What is the purpose
of our mission currently in Iran and Iraq? Are we going to be back in
Iraq with another half million troops over there? Are we prepared to
spend another trillion dollars in another war in Iraq?
The message that I am trying to get across tonight is that it is not
the fault of one party or another. It is the fault of both parties. I
think the American people actually recognize this because essentially
there is a universal disdain for all of those in office. If you have
missed this, if you haven't noticed this, you are missing out on
something big that is happening in America. What is happening in
America is that people are very, very upset that nothing seems to
improve, that the waste continues on and the spending continues on.
Look at projects that are wasteful. I will give you another example
of a project that really annoys people. This project is one where we
spent $250,000 bringing 24 kids from Pakistan and bringing them to
Space Camp in Alabama. There are hundreds and hundreds of these
projects. We have American kids who can't afford to go to Space Camp in
Alabama. What in the world are we doing borrowing money from China to
send it to Pakistan to bring some of their kids to Space Camp? It is
outrageous. We are bankrupting the country with this, and it goes on
and on.
One of the reasons there is never any reform in our spending is
because we don't address spending the way we properly should. There are
12 different departments of government and about 10 years ago was the
last time that we actually passed appropriation bills. So there are 12
departments of government. We should pass them and exercise the power
of the purse by passing the individual appropriations bills. If we were
to do that, that is when we would begin to reform. That is when we
would begin to say that we don't have the money to spend on this. That
is when we would ask tough questions.
But Congress has become a shell of itself. Congress has become so
miniscule as to be almost insignificant. This is with regard to almost
all policy. The executive branch writes the regulations. The executive
branch fights the wars, and we do nothing. We have been at war almost
constantly for the last 20 years. We have been at war in Syria and now
in Iraq for over a year, and yet Congress has not weighed in.
Congress has not voted to give the President any authority. Some will
say: Well, we gave him that authority on 9/11. Well, go back and read
the use of authorization of force from 9/11. Read the use of
authorization of force and see what is in there. What you will find is
in there is that it was directed toward those who attacked us on 9/11.
Well, they did not attack us from Iraq. Iraq had nothing do with 9/11.
Yet we use that same resolution from 15 years ago.
Think about the absurdity of this. Think about the absurdity of using
a resolution from 2001 to fight war forever. Really, can a vote from a
Congress--and probably more than half of us were not part of that
Congress in 2001--can that vote really be used to bind generation after
generation after generation in perpetual war?
We find also that it is both sides really. Both sides have supported
the war in Iraq. You had Hillary Clinton support the war when she was
here. She now runs away from this. But you also have Hillary Clinton
who is still involved with wanting us to be back involved in Syria,
calling for a no-fly zone.
Before we get involved, should we not have a debate in Congress?
There is an extraordinary amount of money that is spent. There is an
extraordinary amount of lives that are lost. In the Iraq war, we spent
over $1 trillion, but we lost also nearly 5,000 of our brave young men
and women over there.
The problem in Washington--and this is an interesting point--many in
the media point out that the problem is incivility and not getting
along. I guess I would argue the opposite, that we get along too well,
that compromise actually comes too easy, and that when you look at
whether there is enough discussion on whether the debt is harming us,
there is actually too much agreement on both sides and lack of concern
really for the debt.
So you have both sides coming together with this bill to basically
say that we are going to give the President an unspecified and
unlimited amount of borrowing power. I think that is bad for the
country.
Mr. FRANKEN. Will the Senator yield for a question?
Mr. PAUL. I think I would prefer to finish up. You know what, I think
each Senator can have an hour. I would love it if you would fulfill the
next hour and make points about why we really are spending our country
into oblivion. But I think I am going to finish my hour.
Mr. President, can you tell me how much time I have remaining?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has approximately 38 minutes
remaining.
Mr. PAUL. Good.
When we look at the problem here, it is not really a problem that
involves a

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lack of compromise. What we have is both right and left have come
together--and not just tonight, right and left have been coming
together for a long time up here. Right and left have been saying: You
scratch my back, and I will scratch yours. Basically, the compromise
is, we both get what we want. The right's sacred cow is military
spending. The left's sacred cow is domestic welfare spending. Both
sides end up getting what they want, but as a consequence, we borrow $1
million every minute.
Many economists have said that our debt is actually the biggest
threat to our future. Many economists have actually said that our debt
is actually costing us about 1 million jobs a year. Kids ask me: What
about a job? What are you going to do to create jobs? What are we going
to do to keep America strong, to keep America producing and
manufacturing and creating millions of jobs?
I think it is the wrong thing to add more debt. I think it is wrong
to spend money you don't have. So often up here, everybody looks and
says ``Well, I am going to do this with the money'' when, indeed, the
first thing we should be asking is where the money is going to come
from. We borrow the money from China, often to send it to Pakistan. We
have sent billions of dollars to Pakistan.
I will give you an example of where we could save some money, and yet
there seems to be very little interest for saving money in Washington.
I put forward an amendment I think about 6 months ago in the Foreign
Relations Committee. My amendment said that any country that persecutes
Christians should not get any of our foreign aid. I have asked people
about this in Kentucky and across the country: Should a country that
persecutes Christians get any of our foreign aid? I have not met
anybody who is in favor of that, and yet almost everybody here is for
it. The vote was 18 to 2 in the committee to continue sending foreign
aid to countries that persecute Christians.
You say: Well, how are you defining that? How do you define the
persecution of Christians.
Pretty easily, actually. We define it as any country that puts a
Christian to death or puts anyone to death for criticizing the state
religion. In Pakistan, it is the death penalty if you criticize the
state religion. It is the death penalty if you convert from the state
religion to any other religion. Yet we pour billions of dollars in
there.
When I tried to end the practice of sending money to countries that
persecute Christians, the response from the other side was, well, this
money is not going to those who are persecuting Christians, the money
is going to the moderates to influence their behavior. The problem is
that there is no objective evidence that they are changing their
behavior. If you look over the last dozen years, you look over the last
two decades in Pakistan, are they becoming more friendly to America?
Are they changing the laws so they don't persecute Christians? Well, it
is actually probably the opposite. In some ways, there has been more
radicalization of Pakistan.
I will give you an example--Asia Bibi. Asia Bibi is a Christian.
There are not many Christians left in Pakistan. Asia Bibi went to the
well in a small Muslim village. She went to the well to draw water. As
she was drawing water, they began to stone her. They stoned her and
beat her with sticks until she was a bloody pulp. As she lay on the
ground crying out for help and hoping that someone would show up,
finally the police came. As the police came, this Christian woman, Asia
Bibi--when the police came, they did not help her, they arrested her.
She was arrested and accused of criticizing the state religion. What is
our response? Our response is to send more money to Pakistan.
We continue to send money--good money after bad--to countries that
abuse their citizenry. Look at a country like Saudi Arabia. Many people
have forgotten that 16 out of the 19 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia.
We still have some questions from the 9/11 report that do discuss Saudi
Arabia, the possibility of Saudi Arabia's involvement in the 9/11
attacks. We also have a Saudi Arabia that has a horrendous human rights
record. This is a question that has been put forward. Some have said
that really their goal is to support women's rights, such as Hillary
Clinton. Yet she has taken tens of millions of dollars from Saudi
Arabia.
In Saudi Arabia, there was a young woman who was 17. They called her
the Girl of Qatif. She was raped. She was gang-raped by seven men. When
they finally brought about justice in Saudi Arabia, their idea of
justice was that the girl who was raped was publicly whipped. She was
whipped for being in the car with an unmarried man.
If you think foreign aid and selling weapons to a country like Saudi
Arabia is going to change their behavior, you have got another thing
coming. If you think selling weapons to Saudi Arabia or selling weapons
to Egypt is somehow changing their behavior or creating a warm fuzzy
feeling in the hearts of Saudi Arabians or Egyptians for us, you have
got another thing coming.
Over a period of time, we sent $60 billion to Egypt. Probably one-
third to half of that was stolen by one family, the Mubarak family. We
also sold a lot of weaponry to them. They ended up using some of the
weaponry on their own people.
As protesters gathered in Tahrir Square in Cairo about a year ago, as
these protests were occurring and hundreds of thousands of people were
showing up, when Mubarak was still in power, Mubarak attempted to quell
the protest. He attempted to stifle the crowd by spraying tear gas on
the crowd. That is bad enough, to try to quell protests with brute
force, but what made it doubly bad is when the Egyptians bent over and
they picked up the empty cartridge from the tear gas, it said, ``Made
in Pennsylvania.''
You see, I think America is a great country. I think by our example
and by our trade and by our diplomatic engagement with the world, we
are the shining light for the world. But when we sell weapons to
countries that then use those weapons to suppress their own people, I
am not so sure that helps American relations around the world.
We should participate as a body more in how the money is being spent.
I think this is one of the points of this resolution. When we see that
we are giving an unspecified amount of borrowing power to the
President--we have done it both ways in the past. We have done it this
way in the past, and I think it is wrong--it was wrong then. But we
have also done it when we have allowed the President to borrow certain
amounts. Many people have argued: We should not have a debt ceiling. We
should never have this problem. It is too disruptive, and we should let
them borrow as much as they want.
I really think the opposite. I think we need to put a closer rein on
what actually happens in government. But I think we also need to
specify and lay out the entire budget. A good example of this is when
we had the Ebola outbreak, and people were looking for money, and they
said there was not enough money. It turns out there was plenty of
money, but the money was being spent on a lot of bizarre things that
come out of the NIH. We looked and we found that over $2 million was
being spent on origami condoms. Well, I think we are fairly good on the
science of condoms, and an extra $2 million on origami condoms was
perhaps not the best use of money. But when you bring out these
outrageous spending examples, you think: Well, certainly we are going
to fix it, right?
Every year I think for the past 20 years there has been a waste book
produced. The waste book has hundreds and hundreds of items that should
be eliminated. Why are they in there every year? Why have we never
fixed any of this? It is because we don't do individual appropriations
bills, we don't look at the individual bills and say: This is how we
will reform it.
Some have said: We are not passing those appropriations bills because
you are trying to tell the President how to spend the money.
Yes. That is what we are supposed to do. That is what the power of
the purse is.
If you ask people around the country what are the things they are
most unhappy about, I know from talking to Republicans and
conservatives that the thing they are most unhappy about with us--and
when I say ``unhappy,'' I mean really unhappy--they are unhappy that we
are not exercising the power of the purse, that basically we are a
rubberstamp for Big Government.

[[Page S7672]]

Others will argue--they will say: We need to be the adults in the
room and we need to govern. We need to govern seamlessly with no
hiccups.
I would say there are two potential problems here. You could argue
that, well, by letting us get close to the brink on the debt ceiling or
getting close to running out of money, that is disruptive and sends a
bad signal to the marketplace. You could argue in the short run that
maybe that is disruptive. But you could also argue that it is
incredibly disruptive to the country to keep borrowing money at $1
million a minute. So I think you have to weigh which is worse. Is it
worse to keep borrowing money at $1 million a minute or is it worse to
actually have a little bit of uncertainty about the debt ceiling?
With regard to the debt ceiling, though, if you look at the debt
ceiling and ask whether we would ever default, we bring in, in tax
revenue, about $250 billion a month. Our interest payments lately have
been averaging about $30 billion. There is actually no risk of
defaulting at all.
We should do the opposite. Instead of scaring the marketplace and
saying that there is any chance of default, we should say that we have
no intention of defaulting. We should say that we will not default. In
fact, we have legislation--I have actually introduced legislation; it
is called the Default Protection Act. It says that we will not default.
It says that the first thing we will spend out of our revenue would be
for our interest. It also says that out of our revenue we would pay for
Social Security. We would fully fund it. We would pay for Medicare and
fully fund it. We would pay for our soldiers' salaries. We would pay
for veterans affairs.
People say: Well, we have little else.
You know, then maybe the question should be--maybe government should
not be doing much beyond interest, soldiers' salaries, veterans
affairs, Medicare, and Social Security. Maybe that is what government
should do and nothing else, at least until we got caught up again, at
least until we had as much money coming in.
What would happen if we did not raise the debt ceiling? If we don't
raise the debt ceiling, we have a balanced budget. Is it really so
awful to concede that we would only spend what comes in? Every American
family does it. Every American family only spends what comes in. I
think it would be good for the country to do that.
But there is an even better way. What many conservatives have offered
is something called cut, cap, and balance. This is a way we could raise
the debt ceiling, and we would temporarily raise it for about a 5-year
period. We would raise the debt ceiling in a gradual manner over about
a 5-year period. The reason you would do that and the reason I would
vote for that is I would vote for it because we would be balancing the
budget. So cut, cap, and balance, we would cut the deficit in half in 1
year. It is the best way to get on a good footing. Let's go ahead and
cut out a significant amount in 1 year, and then it makes it a lot
easier in the successive years if you hold the line.

Calvin Coolidge was incredible with this kind of stuff. In Amity
Shlaes' book she goes through in exquisite detail--wonderful detail--
how he ended up balancing the budget. In those days the President was
paid a pretty good amount for those days. I think it was about
$100,000, but everything came out of their salary. So when an
ambassador for France came for dinner, the dinner came out of
Coolidge's salary. So Coolidge would be down in the kitchen after
dinner saying: I noticed we cooked five hams. I think we could have
done with four hams.
That was the kind of handle he had on expenditures. He also had a
handle on expenditures throughout government, and he met every week
with the Treasury Department. He met every week with the Cabinet
Secretary to say: This is how we are going to stop spending money. This
is how we are going to stop wasting money.
Cut, cap, and balance is an alternative to what we are putting
forward. I think if we were a true, open, and deliberative body we
would have a vote on that, but no vote has been scheduled for cut, cap,
and balance. So those of us--and I think there were a significant
number who said that this was not a good deal. Those of us who believe
it to be not a good deal were not allowed the opportunity to have an
alternative.
The alternative we have is called cut, cap, and balance. In cut, cap,
and balance, we would cut the debt or cut the deficit in half in 1
year. We would cap spending.
This deal actually does the opposite of capping spending. This deal
actually gets rid of the caps and exceeds the caps on spending. We
would cap spending at 18 percent of GDP. That means you would multiply
18 percent by the total dollar amount of the economy and that is what
we would spend.
Why did we choose 18 percent? We chose 18 percent because that is
about what comes in historically on average. If you look over the past
20 years, we have occasional times when we bring more money in,
occasional times when we bring in less, but on average we bring in
about 18 percent. So really if you want to balance your spending--which
would be the responsible thing if we were responsible adults, if we
cared about the American people, cared what they thought, and cared
that they were worried about the debt we were adding--we would spend
about what comes in. So 18 percent is about what comes in. If we spent
18 percent, we would have a balanced budget.
I think people ought to think about it in this perspective: We bring
in $3 trillion. Our problem isn't so much how much money comes in, our
problem is that we spend in excess of what comes in.
Couldn't we just spend what comes in? Couldn't we spend $3 trillion?
Couldn't we have a strong country? I think we would actually be a
stronger country if we spent only what comes in. We wouldn't have
``no'' government, and in some ways we might have a government that was
even bigger than I desire. If we only spent what comes in, if we spent
the $3 trillion--and that is all we spent--think how strong we would
become again as a country. Think about the strength of our marketplace,
the strength of the stock market, the strength of our job creation if
we were only spending what comes in.
This is not a new problem. It has accelerated under this President,
but I think we should be very ecumenical with the blame. There is
enough blame to go around. I think there is an unholy alliance. The
problem in Washington is not lack of cooperation, it is too much
cooperation. We have decided, right and left, that we want to spend
more money, but we don't have the money. So what do we do? We say we
are going to simply borrow it, but there are repercussions to
borrowing. There are repercussions to spending money we don't have. I
think this is a point in time when we should reevaluate. It is a point
in time where maybe you ought to spend time and go home.
I know when I am at home I don't meet anybody who is for this deal.
Those who vote for this deal--maybe if you are from a State that isn't
concerned about the budget, isn't concerned about the debt, you may get
away with it, but I think people are going to have a rude awakening
when they get home because outside of DC the antipathy for this deal is
rising. The anger is rising. The belief that basically everybody needs
to be sent home from Washington is a rising sentiment in the country
because we don't appear to be listening.
If you ask people--and I ask people all the time. Do you think we
ought to have term limits? The answer is yes.
Would the Parliamentarian inform me of how much time remains.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Capito). The Senator has 19 minutes
remaining.
Mr. PAUL. When I have discussed this issue with folks at home, with
constituents in Kentucky, the question they ask me is, How can you give
the President an unspecified amount to borrow? Weren't you elected to
try to stop this? I was elected in 2010 when the tea party movement
arose. The tea party movement arose--and this is an interesting, maybe
some say, historical fact--the tea party arose not so much in criticism
of Democrats; the tea party folks weren't those who really believed the
Democrats would be fiscally responsible. The tea party arose because
they were concerned that Republicans weren't being fiscally
responsible. The tea party arose largely as a rebuke to the Republican
Party. The tea party arose and said: You know what, bailing out the
banks wasn't something the average middle class,

[[Page S7673]]

ordinary, conservative Republican supported. We didn't support the
bailouts. We didn't support President Obama's huge and enormous
government stimulus, nearly $1 trillion. We also don't support
borrowing or lending money for these programs. There are two ways you
can stop this. You can stop this by voting against the spending, which
there doesn't seem to be a significant amount of will in this body on
either side of the aisle to stop and discontinue this profligate
spending. So it is spending and borrowing, spending and borrowing.
Which comes first? Well, they go hand-in-hand, but it is a real
problem. I think it is a problem that threatens the very fabric of our
country, and it is why I ran for office.
The reason I ran for office is because I was concerned we were
accumulating so much debt that we were piling on debt that ultimately
could lead to the destruction of our country. People say: Well, we are
a strong country. The debt will never bring us down.
We are at a point where our debt basically just about equals our
economy, 100 percent of our economy, and that is a tipping point. Many
economists who look at the economics of nations have looked at that and
said: We are at a tipping point. We are at a point where if we do
nothing, if we continue to give a blank check to the government, if we
give a blank check to this President for his final year in office, what
might happen?
This is a President who is going to add more debt than all of the
previous Presidents combined, and we are going to give him a blank
check? Those who vote for this deal will be giving the President a
blank check. They will say: You can borrow whatever you want. Fill in
the blank.
That ought to be the title of this bill: ``Fill in the blank.''
How much debt do you want? Fill in the blank.
There is no specific amount. This bill will allow for unlimited
addition of debt. This bill is exactly why people are upset and angry
with Washington.
The fact that this bill is going to slide through is exactly why
Congress has about a 10-percent approval rating. People here scratch
their heads and can't figure it out. This is why. They don't want you
to act like adults and govern over this enormous debt. They want you to
act. They want you to do something. They want you to quit the borrowing
and spending.
The lesson that needs to be learned is that this isn't one-sided.
This is not the fault of one party, this is a two-party problem. These
are the two parties getting together in an unholy alliance and spending
us into oblivion.
People say: Well, how will we defend the country? Don't we need more
money?
We have increased military spending by 50 percent since 9/11 in real
dollars. There is waste in the Pentagon. I have been arguing that we
should audit the Pentagon. The Pentagon says they are too big to be
audited. How insulting. It goes on and on.
The frustration of the American people is that as it goes on and on,
nothing ever changes. The establishment in Washington is completely and
utterly tone deaf to the way America feels about this. All you have to
do is drive outside the beltway, enter into America, and ask the first
person you meet at a supermarket: Do you think we should keep borrowing
more money?
I don't care what party they are in. I defy you to drive outside the
beltway, stop at a gas station, stop at a supermarket, and ask the
first person: Do you think we should increase the debt and increase
spending at the same time? Do you think we should increase the debt? Do
you think we should increase the debt ceiling with an unspecified
amount?
Ask any parent of a college-age kid whether we should give them a
credit card with no limit. If your child comes to you and has $2,000 on
the credit card, what do you do? You tell them they have to watch their
spending. Do you give them more money? No.
Should we give Congress more money? Hell, no. Congress is bad with
money. They are not good with money. Do not trust them with any more
money. It is a mistake, a huge mistake, to give this body any more
money. We should be doing the opposite. We should be binding this body
with the chains of the Constitution that say only certain powers were
delegated to Congress, only certain powers under article I, section 8,
and we shouldn't allow for unlimited government.
Our Founding Fathers were concerned about a big government, but they
were also concerned about a big and overwhelming military that was
there all the time and would tend to grow. Even some of our greatest
heroes--President Eisenhower worried about the military industrial
complex. So there have been leaders in the past who have said we have
to be careful that we don't get to a point where the contractors are
driving Congress, where the contractors are creating a situation in
which their concerns and their well-being are more important than the
well-being of the country.
Will the Parliamentarian report on the time remaining.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 13 minutes remaining.
Mr. PAUL. Some will criticize this exercise of keeping the Senate
awake at night. The rumblings can be heard, but what I would say is
that the future of the country is worth the time spent. One of the
reasons we are spending the middle of the night discussing this is that
we don't have an ordinary process for proposals. We don't have an
ordinary process for amending bills.
Were there to be an ordinary process where conservatives would be
allowed an alternative such as cut, cap, and balance--we actually did
that in 2011 when the opposite party was in charge. We did have a vote
on cut, cap, and balance. It actually passed. It passed in the House
overwhelmingly and was defeated in the Senate, but the fact is there
are other alternatives. There isn't just one alternative. The only
alternative shouldn't be that we continue to go further and further
into debt.
Sometimes people say: Well, I can't even conceive of $1 trillion. It
is just this enormous money, this enormous amount of money. What is $1
trillion?
To illustrate what $1 trillion is, imagine if you had thousand-dollar
bills in your hand and you had thousand-dollar bills stacked four
inches high. That would be $1 million. But if you want to imagine $1
trillion, in thousand-dollar bills it would be 63 miles high. That is
what we are talking about adding.
While they have not specified how much debt they are going to burden
us with, many are estimating that it will be over $1 trillion. So when
you think about what your government is doing to you tonight, think
about how much of a burden of debt the next generation will get in just
the next year, just from this bill over the next year and a half--over
$1 trillion. If you want to know how much that is, imagine thousand-
dollar bills stacked 63 miles high. That is the burden we are passing
on to the next generation.
None of this is an argument for no government. None of this is an
argument for no Federal Government. In fact, this is an argument for
just spending what comes in. We actually have a lot of money that comes
in; $3 trillion comes in. Could we not simply live with the $3 trillion
that comes in? What would happen to the country if we only spent what
comes in? Would there be some sort of calamity? I think it would
actually be the opposite. I think it would send a signal to the world
that we are serious, that we are going to make America great again.
America's greatness was founded upon fiscal sanity, small government.
Liberty thrives when government is small. We need a government that
is small and restrained by the Constitution. If we had a government
that was restrained by the Constitution, we wouldn't be in this fix.
Many of the functions of government we do up here are not written into
the Constitution and were never delegated to the Federal Government.
The reason we have gotten into this fix is because we have gotten away
from the confines of the Constitution.
Jefferson once said that the chains of the Constitution will bind
government. Patrick Henry said that the Constitution is not about
restraining the people; the Constitution was intended to restrain the
government.
There has been a long history of this. This is not something that has
occurred overnight. If you want to go back and see the history of
people trying to restrain their government and keep their government
small, you can

[[Page S7674]]

probably go back to the plains of Runnymede in 1215. When the Magna
Carta was passed, that was one of the first explicit sort of explosions
of people saying to government enough is enough; the king does not have
unlimited power.
This goes against the character and the charter of the Magna Carta,
which tried to limit the power of the monarch. Instead, we are giving
unlimited power to borrow to the President. So if you look at the
character of the Magna Carta and you look at the character of our
Founding Fathers, who wanted to have restraint, who wanted government
to be restrained by rules, what you find is that we are going headlong
in the wrong direction. What we need is to obey the Constitution once
again. When we obey the Constitution, I think what would happen is that
the budget would balance almost automatically. It would balance every
year.
Washington does need to have compromise, but this is the wrong kind
of compromise. The compromise is going in the wrong direction. What we
need is compromise that actually reduces spending. Instead, we have
compromise, or so-called compromise, that is actually increasing
spending.
This deal will give the President unspecified and unlimited power to
borrow money without limits. In the President's last year in office he
will be able to borrow whatever--no limits whatsoever. We are
abdicating our role as a constitutional body to limit and check the
power of the Presidency with this.
Some will say: Oh, you are only saying this because it is a President
of the opposite party. I would be saying this if it were a President of
either party because we have allowed too much power to gravitate to the
Presidency, and this allows even more.
Will the Parliamentarian give an update on the time remaining.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 5\1/2\ minutes remaining.
Mr. PAUL. In the remaining time, I would like to talk about a budget
point of order that I will be putting forward. This legislation does
something that many in this body have been critical of in the past. It
actually takes money from the obligations to Social Security and
transfers them to a more immediate program.
Specifically written into the budget rules, though, were rules that
say: If you are going to take money, if you are going to steal money
from Social Security, from people who are retired and who have put it
in there, and you are going to spend it on something else, there is a
special budget point of order that says in order to do this you will
need 60 votes. So we will be putting forward a budget resolution that
says: If you are going to steal money from Social Security, if you are
going to take money from Social Security and you are going to spend it
on other concerns--people will say: Oh, well, we are going to spend it
on disability. Well, the Social Security fund was put forward as a
pension plan. You have an obligation to those who put the money in. So
stealing money from people who will be getting money in the future to
pay for immediate concerns is robbing Peter to pay Paul.
So those in this body will be asked tonight to vote on whether or not
you are willing to vote to take money from Social Security to spend it
on immediate concerns. This is sort of like saying: All right, I have a
pension fund. Let's say I have $100,000 in my pension plan, but I want
to go to the racetrack and I need some money this week. So I am willing
to take the $100,000 out, and I am willing to pay a $30,000 penalty. I
am willing to do it because I am an addict, and I am addicted to
spending, and I have to spend the money now.
That is what it is, and you are all guilty of it, right and left. You
are going to take money out of the Social Security fund, and you are
going to spend it on an immediate fix. And by fix, I mean not fixing
the program. By fix, I mean what a junkie does. A junkie is addicted to
spending. That is what the problem is here, that we are addicted to
spending.
So, Madam President, at this point I raise a point of order against
the pending motion pursuant to section 311(a) of S. Con. Res. 11, the
concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2016. The
legislation reallocates payroll between the retirement and disability
programs and therefore breaches the budget act. I ask for the yeas and
nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, pursuant to section 904 of the
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 and the waiver provisions of
applicable budget resolutions, I move to waive all applicable sections
of that act and applicable budget resolutions for purposes of the House
message, and I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
Mr. PAUL. Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The yeas and nays have been ordered.
Is there further debate on the motion to waive?
If not, the question is on agreeing to the motion to waive.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator
from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 64, nays 35, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 293 Leg.]

YEAS--64

Alexander
Ayotte
Baldwin
Barrasso
Bennet
Blumenthal
Booker
Boxer
Brown
Cantwell
Capito
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Cochran
Collins
Coons
Cornyn
Donnelly
Durbin
Feinstein
Franken
Gillibrand
Graham
Hatch
Heinrich
Heitkamp
Hirono
Kaine
King
Kirk
Klobuchar
Leahy
Manchin
Markey
McCain
McCaskill
McConnell
Menendez
Merkley
Mikulski
Murkowski
Murphy
Murray
Nelson
Peters
Reed
Reid
Roberts
Rounds
Sanders
Schatz
Schumer
Shaheen
Stabenow
Tester
Thune
Tillis
Udall
Warner
Warren
Whitehouse
Wicker
Wyden

NAYS--35

NOT VOTING--1

Vitter

The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 64, the nays are
35.
Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
The majority leader.

Vote on Motion to Concur With Amendment No. 2750

Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I move to table the motion to concur
with the amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.

Vote on Motion to Concur

Mr. McCONNELL. I know of no further debate on the motion to concur.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate?
If not, the question is on agreeing to the motion to concur.
Mr. TILLIS. I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator
from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 64, nays 35, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 294 Leg.]

YEAS--64

Alexander
Ayotte
Baldwin
Barrasso
Bennet
Blumenthal
Booker
Boxer
Brown
Cantwell
Capito
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Cochran

[[Page S7675]]

Collins
Coons
Cornyn
Donnelly
Durbin
Feinstein
Franken
Gillibrand
Graham
Hatch
Heinrich
Heitkamp
Hirono
Kaine
King
Kirk
Klobuchar
Leahy
Manchin
Markey
McCain
McCaskill
McConnell
Menendez
Merkley
Mikulski
Murkowski
Murphy
Murray
Nelson
Peters
Reed
Reid
Roberts
Rounds
Sanders
Schatz
Schumer
Shaheen
Stabenow
Tester
Thune
Tillis
Udall
Warner
Warren
Whitehouse
Wicker
Wyden

NAYS--35

NOT VOTING--1

Vitter

The motion was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.

____________________