John Barrasso

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I spent the last 4 weeks traveling all around the great State of Wyoming--from Cheyenne to Cody--and visited with people and families from all across the State. There was the State fair in Douglas, the Dubois firefighters' picnic, the River Festival and Shrimp Boil in Green River, WY, and pancake festivals in New Castle and Meeteetse. One year ago, at events like this all around Wyoming, Wyoming families told me that they were very concerned because America, as they saw it, was heading in the wrong direction. They were really stressed about paying high prices a year ago. They were very angry about the wide open southern border. They were very anxious about what could have been a $4 trillion tax increase had the Democrats gotten their way. Well, Democrats have been the party of high prices and open borders, so it is no surprise that people in my home State and in the Presiding Officer's were so very concerned. They were concerned because they saw our country and their future. They were less safe and less prosperous. They were facing a grim reality--but, oh, what a difference a year makes. Today, America is heading in the right direction. America is back on track. It is what I heard in every corner of Wyoming and what Americans are seeing all across the Nation. On Labor Day, just this past weekend, gas prices were at a 5-year low for Labor Day gas prices. Small business optimism is at the highest in 5 months. Half a million new jobs have been created. Real wages continue to go up. Inflation is staying low, and we are repeatedly beating the economists' expectations. Here in Washington, DC, a city known for its crime--now this city is safer and cleaner thanks to President Trump's commonsense policies. The American people were right to trust President Trump and Republicans in Congress to get America back on track. This is the beginning of the great American comeback. The Republicans' working families tax cuts law is going to continue to make historic progress. Wyoming families are going to be saving $2,400 this year because of the tax cuts. Now, that is according to a new analysis by the Tax Foundation. That is money back in people's pockets, paychecks, purses. That is where it belongs. This law cuts taxes on tips. No tax on tips puts an extra $1,300 back into the pockets of waiters, barbers, bartenders. The law also cuts taxes on overtime. No taxes on overtime puts an extra $1,400 back into the paychecks of nurses, firefighters, police officers. The child tax credit is higher. This saves working families $2,200 per child per year. Seniors are going to pay less in taxes this year because of a new $6,000 deduction on Social Security benefits. The bottom line is this: Americans are going to keep more of what they earn. This is going to send less of the hard-earned money to Washington, DC, and Wyoming people clearly understand the meaning of wasteful Washington spending. At the Wyoming State Fair in Douglas, I joined Wyoming families in celebrating our State's rich heritage and history. Republicans' new law supports our farmers and ranchers. The law's disaster assistance helps families whose grazing lands are destroyed by wildfires or by drought. Its full expensing of up to $2.5 million for new equipment is also going to help grow businesses. The change in our law to the death tax? Well, that is going to ease families' burdens and our worries, specifically providing certainty for families into the future. These policies make our farmers and our ranchers more prosperous and help feed the Nation. Not a single Democrat voted for these popular policies--policies that are making America safer and more prosperous--not a single one. Every single Democrat voted, instead, to raise taxes by $4 trillion. That would have been the largest tax increase in American history. So it is no surprise Democrats are putting the fear before the facts when it comes to this law. Just yesterday, Senator Schumer came to the floor and falsely claimed that the law doesn't help our rural hospitals. I need to set the record straight on that. Republicans created a $50 billion hospital--rural hospital--fund. It is specifically for rural hospitals. The Presiding Officer is from a rural hospital State, as am I. I am a doctor. I practiced medicine in Wyoming for two decades. I was the president of our Wyoming State Medical Society. I was the chief of staff of the hospital in which I practiced. I am in close contact with the hospitals and the doctors in my State. Since ObamaCare became law over a decade ago, more than 100 rural hospitals have closed across the country. Many more are now at risk today. This $50 billion rural hospital fund means real relief for our Nation's rural hospitals. Yet every Democrat in this body voted against helping rural hospitals--every one of them. Democrats in this very body even introduced legislation in July to eliminate this $50 billion rural hospital fund. Senator Schumer came to this very floor, and he bragged about the introduction of this bill that would hurt rural hospitals. At the same time, Democrats voted to continue to give free--free--taxpayer-funded healthcare to illegal immigrants. That compounded the disaster of 4 years of Joe Biden's open border policies. Well, President Trump took immediate action--action to secure the border, action to end the chaos, action to protect American citizens. This message is now clear around the world: Don't come here and expect to get through our border if you are illegally trying to come here. Illegal crossings are now at record lows. For 3 months in a row, zero illegal immigrants were released into our country--zero. Republicans in Congress went even further with our recent bill. We are finishing the wall at the southern border, hiring more border agents, and investing in Immigration and Customs Enforcement. From cutting taxes to securing the border, America is safer, stronger, and more prosperous today than it was a year ago. This is all the result of the work of President Trump and Republicans in Congress. The people of Wyoming feel the difference, and they are not alone. People all across America see that our Nation is getting back on track.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn), the Senator from West Virginia (Mrs. Capito), the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Hagerty), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Hagerty) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 293.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 10 a.m. on Thursday, September 4; that following the prayer and the pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and notwithstanding rule XXII, the Senate proceed to executive session to resume consideration of Executive Calendar No. 262, Maria Lanahan, and that at 11:30 a.m., the Senate vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the Lanahan nomination, and following that cloture vote, the Senate vote on the motion to invoke cloture on Executive Calendar No. 292, Edward Artau, and if cloture is invoked on the nominations individually, all postcloture time be expired, and the Senate vote on confirmation of the nominations at a time to be determined by the majority leader, in consultation with the Democratic leader, no earlier than Monday, September 8, and if confirmed, the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action; further, notwithstanding rule XXII, following the cloture vote on the Artau nomination, the Senate resume legislative session and resume consideration of the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 115, S. 2296, the National Defense Authorization Act, and all postcloture time be expired at 1:45 p.m.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, for 9 long months, the Senate Democrats have waged an unprecedented effort to slow down the Senate and to delay the President from getting his team on the field. It has been an unprecedented blockade. President Trump was elected to get America back on track, and that means getting the team on the job. So what did Chuck Schumer, who just spoke here on the Senate floor, have to say? Well, he put out a press release in August, and he said that ``historically bad nominees''--his words--``deserve a historic level of scrutiny.'' You see, he has treated every nominee from President Trump as controversial, and he has treated every nominee as an existential threat to our Nation. If Senator Schumer and Senate Democrats have specific concerns with specific nominees, they should come down to the Senate floor and discuss them and share their concerns with the American people. That is not what is happening. Here are the facts: Senate Republicans have confirmed now 109 sub- Cabinet nominees. Now, that is in addition to the Cabinet that we have confirmed and the judges that we have confirmed. Every single one of those 109 sub-Cabinet nominees has been filibustered by the Democrats. Yet only seven of them received more than 10 minutes of debate on the Senate floor. Now, you know, Mr. President, when they filibuster, that consumes 2 hours on the Senate floor to debate the nominees. They have chosen to waste the time but not to discuss the credibility of any of these nominees or their qualities for service, what we will get. In fact, of the Democrats who filibustered all 109 sub-Cabinet nominees, the average Democrat debate was 2 minutes. Eighty-seven had zero Democrat debate, and only 7 went on for more than 10 minutes. In other words, Senate Democrats declined to come to the floor to discuss 75 percent of these sub-Cabinet nominees that ultimately were all confirmed by the U.S. Senate. This is in spite of the fact that each one of them required the 2 full hours of debate. On average--we have done all the math; we watched all the speeches--2 minutes 12 seconds, by the Democrats, were consumed discussing each nominee, on average; 218 hours of debate time spent on the Senate floor, ignored by the Democrats, wasted time. We couldn't do legislation. We couldn't do other things because of this historic obstruction by the Democrats of what the American people voted for. For all the bluster and all the so-called historic scrutiny, the Democrats and Chuck Schumer, when it came to nominees, have been missing in action. These guys actually spent more time on the Senate floor debating and discussing wasteful Washington spending--such as using taxpayer dollars for electric vehicles in Africa--than they did on all 109 sub-Cabinet nominees combined. The Senate Democrats and Chuck Schumer froze the Senate floor for 210 hours from doing the important public business as a result of their unprecedented blockade. It is time for the Senate to return to normalcy, to regular order, and that is because there are still 145 nominees on the Executive Calendar that we have right here on our desk waiting to be confirmed. These are people who have gone through the hearing process, have been voted out of committees, and are stuck here in the Senate limbo of waiting to see what is going to happen with their confirmation. They are waiting to help in the fight to get America back on track and to do the people's business, and the Democrats are obstructing every step along the way. It seems like the Democrats just want to sabotage our effort to get America back on track. Otherwise, why are they standing in the way of the progress of our Nation? We know these nominees are all qualified-- the 145 I have just referred to--because committees have actually reported them out to the Senate. They have had background checks from the FBI; their ethics reports have all been confirmed; and they have actually been approved by the Senate committees, the committees whose job it is to scrutinize. That is why half of the 145 that we are still waiting to come to the Senate floor, they have earned bipartisan support coming out of committees. They are ready to go, ready to get put to work. So the minority leader needs to stop pretending that he is leading some kind of grand investigation because he is not. It is time for him to admit that this has nothing to do with the qualifications of the nominees. His objections have everything to do with his obsession with President Trump. That is what we are dealing with here. Many of these bipartisan nominees have been waiting for months to get put to work. They have been nominated. They have put their lives on hold. They are ready to go. Yet the Democrats, through their sabotaging, have slowed the process to a crawl, and there is absolutely no reason for this. Look, this latest Schumer shutdown of this confirmation process, it really does leave critical jobs unfilled; it does weaken our economy; it does undermine our international diplomacy; and it jeopardizes our safety. The Senate, in the past, didn't operate this way, and we need to change things to get America back on track and get the Senate back on track. You know, 98 percent of George W. Bush's--President Bush's-- nominees and Bill Clinton's nominees, they were confirmed by voice vote or unanimous consent. They had gone through the committee process; they were sent to the Senate and then worked through the process pretty quickly. During President Trump's second term, the number that went by voice vote or unanimous consent--here we are, 9 months in--zero. Absolutely zero. Why? Because of what the Democrats are doing in an unprecedented way. They seem to be obstructing for obstruction's sake. Today, 45 of the 145 nominees stuck on the calendar are, interestingly, for positions that never before in the history of the Senate have actually had to come up for a rollcall vote. They always went by voice vote or unanimous consent. So I would ask the Senate minority leader, if he were on the floor, to tell me why the Chief Counsel for Advocacy at the Small Business Administration--I mean, that is the position--why that needed to be filibustered. Why did he and the Democrats filibuster the Chief Counsel for Advocacy for the Small Business Administration? What was so critical about that position or so wrong with the nominee that the Democrats would decide it was worthy of spending 2 hours of Senate floor business to filibuster this nominee who got confirmed anyway and in the past has never had a vote on that? It has always gone by unanimous consent or by voice vote. Confirming positions like this used to only take seconds. Now it can take days, and it is because of the obstruction by the Democrats. The Senate has a role of advice and consent. That is why we have the committee process. That is why we go through it. But what we are dealing with is stalling and delaying. There are still more than 800 positions that still need to come through the Senate. Some have not been named yet; the President has not made nominations because the President has over 1,100 nominations to make to fill out the government and the people that do the job of the people. But without a change to try to get through that next 800, that would take years, over 1,000 hours on the Senate floor. And that is if the Senate did nothing else because every time they filibuster one, those are 2 wasted hours, and they end up spending 2 minutes of debate in total. And 81 percent of them nominated who got approved, the Democrats spent zero time on the floor even talking about. Look, under this Schumer confirmation shutdown, it is impossible for the U.S. Senate to pass legislation--we can't do it; the floor is iced--legislation such as the National Defense Authorization Act that we are getting to today, we are considering it this week; funding bills that we need to do the appropriations bills that Schumer never even brought to the floor when he was the leader. We want to get those passed, doing the people's business. The Senate and our Nation cannot continue to be run this way and controlled this way and function this way. If Democrats won't stop abusing the rules of the Senate, Republicans are prepared to change the rules. Later today, Senate Republicans are going to discuss how to update these rules to restore the Senate's longtime practice, a practice of confirming nominees in a reasonable fashion. Now, we are not talking about Cabinet Secretaries or Supreme Court Justices. We are talking about restoring the norms of the Senate for the hundreds of routine, qualified nominees who come through the committee process, go through the scrutiny, and then come to the Senate floor to be put to work. I would say, enough with the Democrat obstruction, enough with this phony scrutiny, and enough with another Schumer shutdown. The American people elected President Trump and they elected Republicans to get America back on track, and that is what we continue and will continue to do. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I have five requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority Leaders. Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott) and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell) and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, reserving the right to object. Senate Republicans included a provision to address this very issue in an appropriations bill that Democrats blocked earlier this week. This issue would have been addressed here on the U.S. Senate floor. Yet Senate Democrats came to the floor and objected to what was in this bill having appropriations and dealing with the funding of the Government of the United States. And the shutdown Democrats, who want to shut down the government, did exactly that. They objected to the appropriations bill that addressed this very item. That is what happened. And what is really happening today, we are here on a Saturday morning in August, on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and why are we here? We are here because Democrats are still trying to distract from the unprecedented obstruction of President Trump's well-qualified nominees. As of this morning, there are still 154 qualified nominees awaiting confirmation in the U.S. Senate. Many have been approved in committee with Democrat support, bipartisan support, in many cases, strong bipartisan support. These are not controversial individuals but patriotic Americans patiently waiting for their opportunity to serve our Nation. So far this year, Democrats have allowed exactly zero--zero--nominees to be confirmed by voice vote. This is a drastic departure from the norms and the traditions of the U.S. Senate. It is very different from how Republicans treated Democrat nominees when we were in the minority in 2021. We continued to work with the other side to reach a fair agreement to end this blockade. I am hopeful that an agreement is within reach, and I objected to this exact legislation 4 days ago. Nothing has changed since Senator Merkley brought this to the floor 4 days ago, other than we continue to be here with an obstruction--a historic obstruction by the Democrats of President Trump's qualified nominees, and therefore I object.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell) and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Kennedy), the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell), the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell) and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Kentucky (Mr. McConnell), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).