Michael Bennet

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, as the Senate debates H.R. 4, I would like to state for the record two motions I have to address some issues with the Rescissions Act of 2025 that I believe the Senate must consider: The following are motions to recommit in the jurisdiction of the Committee on Appropriations: Mr. Bennet moves to recommit the bill H.R. 4 to the Committee on Appropriations with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would strike provisions that prevent Americans in rural communities from having access to Wireless Emergency Alerts or presidential emergency alerts. Mr. Bennet moves to recommit the bill H.R. 4 to the Committee on Appropriations with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would strike provisions that prevent American children from having access to civics education or the opportunity to learn about our democratic system of government. This legislation would cut $1.1 billion in funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which supports over 1,500 public radio and television stations across the country, including over 50 in Colorado. Colorado outlets stand to lose over $7.6 million in funding-- with a disproportionate effect for rural and Tribal communities across the State. News organizations like Colorado Public Radio, Rocky Mountains PBS, and smaller stations like KRZA in Alamosa and KVNF in Paonia are at risk. Not only does CPB funding provide needed resources for local outlets--the lifeblood of our democracy, responsible for ensuring informed debate and holding power to account--but these funds also support a wide array of free, easily accessible educational programming and resources for our children. Moreover, rescinding these funds would jeopardize key elements of our Nation's emergency alert architecture, including the Wireless Emergency Alert System and the Public Radio Satellite System. This proposal's principal outcome will be the further erosion of our local media, the impoverishment of our children's educational opportunities, and the dismantling of our country's critical emergency infrastructure that saves countless lives every year. I urge my colleagues to support these motions and reject the legislation before us today.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I have a motion to commit at the desk.

Mr. BENNET. I ask the reading of the motion be dispensed with.

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, the legislation we are debating today would modestly increase the size of the child tax credit while leaving out more than 17 million children from the full credit. America's poorest children, whose families are struggling to make ends meet, receive nothing from this bill. Everywhere I go in Colorado, I meet parents who are working hard--often two and three jobs--just to keep their family's heads above water, like Americans all across this country. They are wrestling with the legacy of 50 years of trickle-down economics that have benefited the wealthiest Americans while leaving working and middle-class families behind, which this bill does again. Today, the United States boasts one of the highest childhood poverty rates in the industrialized world. This is a moral disgrace, but we know how to end childhood poverty in this country. In 2021, we expanded the child tax credit and cut childhood poverty nearly in half and cut hunger by a quarter.

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, we should refuse to pass a bill that adds millions to our debt in order to cut taxes for the wealthiest while doing nothing for our kids. I urge my colleagues to support this motion.

Mr. BENNET. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, as the Senate debates H.R. 1, I would like to state for the record several motions I have to address a range of issues with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB) that I believe the Senate must address. The following are motions to commit in the jurisdiction of the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry: Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would ensure that the Secretary of Agriculture continues to pay States 50 percent of the administrative costs incurred in operating the supplemental nutrition assistance program established under the Food and Nutrition Act of 2008 (7 U.S.C. 2011 et seq.) in order to prevent overburdening States with those costs. The proposal currently in the bill would force states to shoulder 75 percent of administrative costs, on top of a proposal that would shift the responsibility for a portion of benefit expenditures onto States. But in States like Colorado, where the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights strictly limits state spending and revenue growth, taking on additional costs of a major Federal program like SNAP, whether through benefit expenditures or increased administrative costs, would be incredibly difficult without cutting other essential services. And Colorado is not alone. Every State faces its own budget constraints, and this kind of cost shift would destabilize the program and put food access at risk when State budgets fall short. SNAP reduces poverty, strengthens rural economies, and generates $1.50 in local economic activity for every Federal dollar invested. It is one of the most effective investments we can make to keep families fed and local economies afloat. That is why we should not be making it harder for States to afford to administer the program. We should be focused on strengthening SNAP's delivery and responsiveness, not destabilizing it. Senator Adam Schiff also supports this motion. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would rescind voluntary conservation funding provided by the Inflation Reduction Act and reinvest the full amount of those rescinded funds into the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, the Conservation Stewardship Program, the Regional Conservation Partnership Program, and the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program. Senators Cory Booker, Adam Schiff, and Peter Welch also support this motion. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would ensure that all rescinded voluntary conservation funding provided by the Inflation Reduction Act is fully reinvested in the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), the Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP), and the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program (ACEP). These programs play a central role in the Department of Agriculture's conservation support. Not only do these programs help farmers and ranchers protect our natural resources, but they are also incredibly popular and consistently oversubscribed. The programs are not just about conservation either. They help producers stay afloat by giving practical ways to manage climate risks while keeping their operations running and providing financial stability. In Colorado, farmers and ranchers are already doing the hard work of conserving water, improving soil health, and protecting the land. These programs support their leadership with voluntary, locally driven solutions. But too often, producers ready to do more are turned away because funding runs out. That is why we made historic investments in conservation through the Inflation Reduction Act. The motion I am submitting today would ensure that every dollar that is rescinded from those investments is returned to these trusted and proven programs. Farmers and ranchers are already stepping up to protect the land and water we all depend on. The least we can do is follow through on the commitments we made to them. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would establish an emergency relief grant program for migrant and seasonal farmworkers affected by federally declared natural disasters. The following are motions to commit in the jurisdiction of the Committee on Finance: Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Finance of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; (2) would strike any provision that forces more paperwork on Medicaid enrollees every 6 months; and (3) would ensure big corporations and the ultra-wealthy pay a fair share in taxes. My motion to commit would cut bureaucratic redtape in the reconciliation bill under consideration today, and I thank Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden for his support of my motion as well. Among the many egregious Medicaid policies in this bill is a requirement that Medicaid expansion adults must prove their eligibility every 6 months--twice as often as they do today. Like the other Medicaid cuts, this is being disguised as cutting waste, fraud, and abuse. But we know that is not what is going to happen. We know that qualified people are going to get inappropriately dropped off Medicaid for administrative reasons. Putting aside whether we think people deserve health insurance regardless of where they live or how much money they make, which incidentally I do, this policy will lead to more people being uninsured, more uncompensated care for hospitals and health clinics, and worse health outcomes. This seems in contradiction to the administration's supposed commitment to Making America Healthy Again, which is why I oppose this provision, along with all of the Medicaid cuts in this bill. My motion to commit will strike this unnecessary and harmful requirement, and I urge my colleagues to support it. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Finance of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would increase the amount and availability of the Child Tax Credit to match levels of the expanded Child Tax Credit, adjusted for inflation, by ensuring big corporations and the ultra-wealthy pay a fair share. Senators Raphael Warnock, Cory Booker, Catherine Cortez Masto, Richard Durbin, and Ron Wyden also support this motion. The following are motions to commit in the jurisdiction of the Committee on Judiciary: Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Judiciary of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would ensure the definition of `affected area' in downwind states includes the States of Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming and the territory of Guam due to the catastrophic amounts of radiation exposure in these areas after U.S. testing above ground nuclear weapons during World War II and the Cold War. Senators John Hickenlooper, Ben Ray Lujan, Ruben Gallego, Jacky Rosen, Catherine Cortez Masto, Martin Heinrich, and Mark Kelly also support this motion. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Judiciary of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would-- (A) establish child-appropriate procedures in immigration court; (B) expand access to legal representation for unaccompanied children; (C) create dedicated children's dockets within immigration courts; and (D) protect the due process rights and safety of children in federal custody. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Judiciary of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would-- (A) streamline the work authorization process for asylum seekers and DACA recipients; (B) reduce USCIS application backlogs through staffing and modernization; (C) ensure timely adjudication of employment-related benefits; and (D) strengthen legal pathways to support economic growth and reduce strain on cities like Denver. Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on the Judiciary of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would-- A. create a path to legal status for long-time agricultural workers; and B. modernize the H-2A visa program to stabilize the farm workforce and protect U.S. food security. The following is a motion to commit in the jurisdiction of the Committee on Foreign Relations: Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would-- (A) support international efforts to disrupt firearms trafficking networks; (B) enhance firearm tracing capabilities and cooperation with Mexico and Central America; (C) prevent U.S. weapons from fueling regional violence and forced migration. The following is a motion to commit in the jurisdiction of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs: Mr. Bennet moves to commit the bill H.R. 1 to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs of the Senate with instructions to report the same back to the Senate in 3 days, not counting any day on which the Senate is not in session, with changes that-- (1) are within the jurisdiction of such committee; and (2) would increase funding for fentanyl interdiction technology and border screening.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Madam President, the hour is late. I want to thank the Presiding Officer for being here. I am glad to be here with my colleague from New Hampshire and my neighbor from New Mexico. I want to thank the floor staff that is here tonight. And I would like to suggest--but it is not the purpose of my speech--that the next time Senators make the suggestion that the floor staff should spend the entire night reading a bill here, that the Senators actually read that bill instead of imposing that on the staff that is here. I think that would be a just thing for us to do and the appropriate and proper thing for us to do. Madam President, the last time that we were headed down this road, which was when Republicans were passing President Trump's 2017 deficit- exploding tax cut, it didn't take a mathematical genius to figure out what was about to happen. I told the Senate at that time that, as our debt grows, we will spend billions more not on schools, roads, and innovation but on interest costs. Worse, we were about to blow another hole in the debt without really helping the middle class, and 8 years ago, I said: On top of that, we know that, when deficits swell, as they surely will, cuts to Medicaid and Medicare will be sure to follow, further burdening working families struggling to make ends meet. Well, here we are. That is exactly the story of this bill. Utterly predictable is this bill which massively increases our deficit when our children can least afford it. The Republican Senators who will be passing this bill tonight or tomorrow morning, if they do, know they are doing it when we have already hit a new milestone for the first time in American history. Our interest payments exceed the amount that we spend on our national defense. For the first time, the American people, because of the irresponsibility of those in this Chamber, are going to pay $1 trillion in interest. That is a massive number. That is essentially the same as what we spend on Medicare; as what we spend on children and higher education together; as what we spend on housing, bridges, broadband, ports, and highways combined. I want to be very clear tonight that over the years, Democrats and Republicans have pursued policies that have led to that $1 trillion in interest payments--there is no doubt about it--and it is worth thinking about what we could do if we hadn't made such fiscally irresponsible choices: expand the child tax credit, as my colleague from Georgia said; cut childhood poverty in half and hunger by a quarter; build a modern energy group to meet our expanding energy demands so Americans in cities and rural communities can enjoy affordable, reliable energy at home; establish a healthcare system that the American people deserve--a modern system that people in other rich, industrialized countries take for granted, a system that does not cost twice as much with worse outcomes like in the United States of America, the richest country in the world, that forces parents to choose between their children's prescriptions and school supplies and that exhausts the American people who, day after day after day, have to fight endless negotiations with their insurance companies just to keep their children covered; that constantly threatens rural hospitals and clinics with closures in this country. No other rich country in the world puts up with that craziness. And we are spending twice as much as any other country in the world to get worse healthcare, worse outcomes, and more scarcity. Every Senator on this floor might make a different choice about the policies that they would enact, their preferred policies, but I doubt that there is anybody here who is willing to go home and defend the virtues of wasting $1 trillion of the American people's money on interest payments. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and outside groups like the Penn Wharton Budget Lab tell us that by the end of the next 10 years, we will have the highest debt ratio ever, eclipsing the debt our Nation had in the 1940s. What was happening in the 1940s? That is when the ``greatest generation'' had borrowed money to defeat economic misery at home through the New Deal and European fascism by becoming the arsenal of democracy. Those were their receipts. Those were the receipts of a generation that understood its commitment to the next generation--to us. When we contemplate from this broken Senate the patriotic accomplishments of the ``greatest generation,'' what has always seemed particularly egregious to me has been the tax policy Republicans have passed four times since Ronald Reagan passed it in 1981. Every single time, they made the same promises--every time. Look it up. They made the same promises that their trickle-down tax policy would drive economic growth, cut our deficit, pay for itself. Every time, including the recent Trump tax cut in 2017, these promises have been false. They have been false. That was 8 years ago. That wasn't a century ago. We know what the math is. Everybody in this room knows the deficit is far worse today than it was when Donald Trump passed those tax cuts. President Trump has had a very rare thing happen, which is he got to take 4 years off and come back and be President. The effect of the tax cuts he passed the last time that he said were going to pay for themselves clearly have not. There is nobody in this Chamber who can deny that. I always find it amazing, when I hear these promises, why people make them if they know they are so false--over and over and over again. I think the reason is that it is a way that politicians in Washington can avoid the objections that you could never get away with at home. Imagine for a minute if there were a mayor in America, any mayor in any town--in Santa Fe, NM; or in Limon, CO; or in Los Angeles, CA--it doesn't matter--a Republican town or a Democratic town. Imagine if a mayor came to join you and said: This town is going to borrow more money than we have ever borrowed before. That would worry you. That would worry me. I think our first question to that mayor would be: OK. That worries me. What are you going to spend the money on that you are going to borrow? Are you going to spend it on schools? No. Are you going to spend it on parks? No. Are you going to spend it on the water infrastructure that so many communities in New Mexico require? Are you going to spend it on the mental health crisis that our teenagers are facing because of our failure to address it? Are you going to spend it on infrastructure? The answer to all those questions would be no. What are you going to spend the money on, Mr. Mayor? Well, the answer is, I am going to give tax cuts to the two richest neighborhoods in town and hope that those trickle down to everybody else. That is the Republican tax policy. There is a reason why no mayor in America has ever done that. There is no mayor in America who has ever pursued trickle-down economics because you would get run out on a rail. You would get run out on a rail if you went and said: We are going to borrow the most money that has ever been borrowed from our children to finance tax cuts for the richest neighborhoods in town. It makes no sense. It is preposterous. Yet that has been the argument since Ronald Reagan first said that these tax cuts will be paid for, that the economy will grow, that there won't be a deficit. There is a reason we are paying more than $1 trillion in interest today, and that is because our deficits are enormous. Fortunately--and this is really important for the American people to understand--we still live in the strongest country in the world. We are in the world's richest economy. We have the most lethal military. Apart from our President, we have a national commitment to an independent judiciary, the rule of law, and low levels of corruption in our economy and in our society. We have unparalleled capital markets, cutting-edge innovation, and world-leading universities. We have all those things going for us partly because the folks who came before us invested in those things and built those things and tended those things. But what we struggle with in our time is a sense amongst most Americans that they can't get ahead, that the American dream is further and further out of reach for themselves and for their families. In my view, that is the biggest challenge our country faces and in the face of this bill's ill-considered tax cuts and cuts to our healthcare system, which is going to throw millions of people off of their healthcare and make healthcare more expensive for everybody else. By the way, what is the logic of that? The logic of that is that when you throw people off their healthcare, they end up going to the emergency room to take care of themselves and take care of their families, just as anybody would. That is the most expensive care that anybody could have. That expense is then put in our insurance policies, and all of us are going to pay more. You can't wish away people just because you throw them off health insurance. When other countries in the world--other wealthy, rich countries in the world--have a system of insurance that basically guarantees healthcare and mental health care to their citizens, it is worth asking why we would throw our people off the not-so-great health insurance that they have. That is a good question. But it is particularly crazy when it just drives up the cost for everybody else. We need to deeply think about the challenges that our country is facing today. It is more unequal. The top 1 percent own 30 percent of our Nation's wealth, and the bottom 50 percent own 2\1/2\ percent. The top 1 percent of Americans own 50 percent of the value of the stock market. The top 1 percent of Americans own 50 percent of the value of the stock market while the bottom 50 percent own just 1 percent of its value. Something that is really affecting my State is that the Nation's median home price is now five times higher than the median family income. As a result, the average first-time home buyer is now 38 years old--38 years old--versus 29 just a generation ago. Reading scores in our Nation have hit a 20-year low. And perhaps most damning and perhaps most upsetting is that our lifespan has declined since the 1980s. We are now, on average, likely to die 6 years sooner than other people who live in wealthy countries around the world. If you are African American, your chance of dying is, on average, 12 years--12 years-- sooner than people living in the industrialized world. If we don't shift course soon, we will be the first generation of Americans whose kids and grandkids will be worse off than we are. That has never happened before. We are on track for that to happen to our children. Many young people today can't afford to live on their own, and they may never be able to afford a house. They can't afford healthcare or childcare. They can't count on a quality education for their children in too many parts of America. Some are really worried about whether they are going to be able to afford a child at all. If you haven't heard a family say that to you in your townhalls or in your meetings, you haven't been paying attention. But instead of addressing any of these challenges, we are debating a bill tonight that will make the wealthiest Americans even wealthier and the poorest Americans even poorer--half a million of whom live in Colorado--while adding millions more to the debt, which working Americans are going to have to pay back. That is what this Republican trickle-down economics comes down to. No matter how you dress it up, that is what it comes down to. Our generation has made some very bad choices when it comes to our children's future. This bill only makes matters worse for them. And all this debt will constrain the choices they are going to be able to make for themselves. That is a shame because, unlike us, perhaps they will aspire to follow in the footsteps of the ``greatest generation'' and build a country where lifespans are growing, not falling; where economic mobility is rising; where poverty and economic anxiety are falling; where energy exports are increasing and emissions are decreasing; where quality healthcare and childcare and education and affordable housing are abundant, not scarce. It seems obvious to me that our child's ambitions should be ours as well. Unfortunately, tomorrow, the Republican majority may pass a bill that takes us further in the wrong direction. In its wake and in its wreckage, Americans who do feel an obligation to the next generation are going to have to fight even harder to fulfill our duty. I yield the floor.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I rise to recognize Scott Fitzwilliams who recently retired after 15 years as forest supervisor of the White River National Forest and 34 years of service to the U.S. Forest Service. Scott led the most visited national forest in the country, covering more than 2 million acres. While supervising the White River, Scott balanced enormous visitor demand with thoughtful stewardship, earning the trust of communities across Colorado's mountains. Scott brought steady leadership to some of Colorado's most complex land management challenges. He managed the visitors at Hanging Lake and the Maroon Bells, navigated the first-ever partnership between the Forest Service and Colorado Parks and Wildlife at Sweetwater Lake, and helped communities recover from the Grizzly Creek and Lake Christine Fires. Scott was a critical source of guidance and expertise for my work. He helped ensure the Camp Hale-Continental Divide National Monument was established with the care and coordination it deserved. On the Thompson Divide, he helped navigate intricate land-use and community concerns and oversaw the implementation of the 20-year mineral withdrawal. He also helped shape practical solutions for the housing crisis affecting mountain towns. His work identifying Forest Service sites suitable for workforce housing informed legislation that we passed in the 2018 farm bill and in the 2024 EXPLORE Act. When we wrote the SHRED Act, a bill designed to keep ski area fees local, Scott made clear why the legislation mattered, pointing to the daily challenges of managing a forest that supports more than a dozen ski areas and sees tens of millions of visitors each year. Throughout his career, Scott was a thoughtful partner and a trusted presence to a wide range of stakeholders, including ranchers, local governments, ski areas, conservation organizations, recreation advocates, and many others. He listened and brought them into the process. His collaborative approach made better outcomes possible across the forest. Even in retirement, Scott has continued to advocate for the Forest Service and for Colorado's public lands. He has made sure the national conversation about conservation includes the people who manage these lands every day. At a time of historic staffing and budget shortfalls, Scott has been a clear and credible voice for the Agency he served for more than three decades. We are grateful for Scott's years of service and leadership. His work leaves a lasting legacy for our State, and I wish him well in whatever comes next.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I rise today to recognize the extraordinary career and well-earned retirement of John Whitney, my senior adviser for Public Lands and Tribal Affairs and regional director for the Western Slope. John spent two decades serving in the U.S. Congress, including the last 14 years in my office and previously in the office of Congressman John Salazar. Throughout his career, John has been one of the most effective advocates for rural communities and conservation efforts in Colorado and the American West. There is no corner of the Western Slope that John doesn't know--and very few people west of the Continental Divide who don't know John. He built deep, lasting relationships with local elected leaders, State and Federal agencies, Tribal governments, and community members--regardless of party or background. John never hesitated to jump in with both feet. Whether advancing landmark legislation or organizing a community meeting in a remote town, he always brought his full self to the work. He organized countless trips for me across our State, from camping on Kebler Pass, to rafting the Dolores River, to hiking the high country of the San Juans. Over the years, John helped shape and deliver some of the most consequential conservation accomplishments in Colorado's recent history. He played a central role in establishing three National Monuments in Colorado: Chimney Rock, Brown's Canyon, and Camp Hale- Continental Divide. He led our work to pass the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Act and secure a 20-year mineral withdrawal to protect the Thompson Divide. John also helped establish the Camp Amache National Historic Site and expand Rocky Mountain National Park, Mesa Verde National Park, and Yucca House National Monument. John was also instrumental in developing the Colorado Outdoor Recreation and Economy (CORE) Act, the Gunnison Outdoor Resources Protection (GORP) Act, and the Dolores National Conservation Area and Special Management Area Act. Additionally, he led efforts to help Western Slope communities through the SHRED Act, the Flexible Partnerships Act, the Gold King Mine Compensation Act, and efforts to expand Tribal access to clean water. But John's legacy is not just the legislation he shaped, it is the coalitions he built and the way he encouraged people across the State to find common ground. His work is a model for what is possible when democracy works as it should, when people listen to one another, stay at the table, and pursue progress without sacrificing principle. John has also been a mentor, a counselor, and a constant source of good humor to our staff. He helped train a new generation of Western Slope leaders and public lands advocates. His influence will echo through their work, through our office, and throughout the State for years to come. I also want to thank John's family; his achievements would not have been possible without their support, generosity, and sacrifice. As John sets off toward new horizons, he leaves behind a legacy that will stand the test of time. Colorado's lands, communities, and civic institutions are stronger because of his service. On behalf of a grateful State and an appreciative team: Thank you, John. You will be deeply missed--and we can't wait to see where your journey takes you next.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I rise today to recognize and honor the remarkable public service of Erin Minks, my senior advisor for rural affairs and regional director for the San Luis Valley. Erin dedicated two decades to Federal service--most of it in Congress--where she has been a tireless advocate for the San Luis Valley. Erin's Congressional career began in the offices of Senator Ken Salazar, Congressman John Salazar, and Senator Mark Udall. Her public service continued with the U.S. Forest Service, where she helped craft a forest plan for the Rio Grande National Forest that will guide land management for decades to come. For the past 7 years, I have had the great privilege of working alongside Erin in my office, where she brought extraordinary knowledge, dedication, and compassion to her work. There is hardly a person in the San Luis Valley who doesn't know Erin. Whether it is a veteran trying to access benefits, a water district applying for a grant, or a local official working on a new idea, Erin is the one they call. She picks up the phone. She shows up. And she gets results. Erin played a central role in delivering real progress for the Valley and rural communities across our State. She led the successful reauthorization of Colorado's three National Heritage Areas--South Park, Cache la Poudre River, and Sangre de Cristo--helping preserve Colorado's history and culture. She developed major pieces of legislation, including the Groundwater Conservation Easement Act--based on local requests to conserve the Rio Grande Basin's aquifer--and the RESILIENT Act to cut redtape for rural communities. Thanks to her advocacy, we have secured millions of dollars in critical Federal funding for community driven projects in the San Luis Valley. Whether through the congressionally directed spending process, grants, or other Federal funding opportunities, Erin knew how to navigate the intricacies of government to get her communities the resources they needed. She has been a relentless champion for the Rio Grande Basin, Rocky Flats workers, Adams State University, Colorado's potato farmers, and the communities that define the valley's identity. Beyond the policy wins, Erin exemplified what it means to be a public servant. She showed younger staff how to lead with empathy, build lasting relationships, and fight for the people they serve. Her work helped ensure rural voices are heard in Washington, and her presence has left a lasting mark on our State. As Erin moves on to her next chapter, I want to express my deepest gratitude and thank her family for sharing her with all of us these many years. Erin, we will miss you. Thank you for your extraordinary service. We wish you the very best in whatever comes next.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss the so-called GENIUS Act, which we are going to vote on in a few minutes here in this Chamber. It is a bill that I think could have gotten to a place where it makes sense, but I am not going to be supporting the legislation because, among other things, we haven't had a real debate on it. We have had no opportunity to offer amendments to make the bill better, and it is still falling short in some really fundamental ways that I am really worried about. I am really worried about the risk to money laundering that I don't think is well addressed in this bill. I am really worried about the regulatory structure, which looks absolutely nothing like the structure that is required for our banks and for foreign banks that want to do business here in the United States. I think we may come to rue the day that we didn't put guardrails in place to protect the American people from what could be a catastrophic effect on our economy just because we had the failure to have the foresight to see the potential risks that we could face. For example--just one example--we commonly require financial institutions like banks to have a subsidiary here in the United States that is regulated by the laws of the United States before they are able to offer banking services to my constituents in Colorado and to all the 330 million Americans whom we have. There is nothing like that in this bill. There is nothing like that in this bill. If some administration official deems a foreign jurisdiction is somehow good enough without it actually being good enough, without it having the benefits of the best regulatory environment in the world, which is ours, then people can do business here issuing crypto; in this case, stablecoins. I think that is a big mistake. As a member of the Intelligence Committee, I think it is a huge mistake that we didn't take on the issues of money laundering that cryptocurrency are presenting and the challenges that it is causing to law enforcement. I think that is a big problem. It is not that we couldn't have fixed it, but we chose not to fix it. As I mentioned earlier, there has not been an effort to make the bill better. There has been no amendment process. Unusually, I had an amendment in this bill for one brief shining moment. I came down to the floor and offered an amendment, and it actually was accepted. It has been decades around this place, I think, since that has happened. All that amendment said was the President and the Vice President and the Members of Congress should not issue crypto; in this case, stablecoins. I would be surprised to learn that 90 percent of the American people think the President or the Vice President or the Members of Congress should issue their own crypto coins while they are in office. That would be shocking to learn. The American people clearly would like a legal regime here that prevents their elected officials, including the people in this body, including in the House of Representatives, including, and most particularly, in the White House should not enrich themselves while they are in office. That was my very simple amendment. That was referred to as the ``Bennet amendment.'' I am proud of that fact. This is not even hard. There is no reason the President--any President--should be issuing crypto while they are in office or a Vice President. There is no reason any person on this floor should do it or anybody in the House of Representatives should do it. And, now, in a partially regulated regime, where we are not dealing with that question, we are sending a signal to the American people that this digital currency has the seal of approval of the entire U.S. Government, of our regulators. That is potentially very dangerous to the financial institutions that may participate in this and to the American people themselves. I have nothing fundamentally against crypto. I have nothing fundamentally against stablecoins. But I think it is fundamentally wrong that elected officials should be able to enrich themselves in this new digital environment. Maybe it is not 98 percent, but I bet you 9 out of 10 Americans agree with me. I will say that this is just one more indication of the U.S. Senate not doing the people's business, of not living up to the expectations of the folks who designed this Chamber to begin with. This bill is going to pass with votes from the Democratic Party, even though there was not a single amendment voted on as part of this bill. I object to that as a Democrat. I can't stop it because there are 60 votes for this legislation, but I think we would have been a lot better off on this bill--just like with almost any bill that comes to the floor of the Senate--to have an open amendment process. I would have loved to have the opportunity to see people vote on a bill that bans Members of the Senate and the House and the President and the Vice President from issuing their own crypto credits. I would have liked to have had a debate that said, Is it a good idea to have foreign governments or foreign investors speculating publicly in the cryptocurrency that a President has issued? Is it a good idea to have foreign entities making $2 billion investments in currency that is issued by American politicians? That is crazy. We could have fixed that in this legislation. Not only did we not fix it, we didn't even have a debate on it. We didn't even have a single amendment come to the floor, we were in such a hurry to do the bidding of the proponents of this legislation. I would urge all my colleagues to vote no on this procedural motion, to go back to the drawing board to have a proper negotiation, to write a piece of legislation that actually would provide the seal of approval in a meaningful way to American investors and to American consumers, and when it comes to the issuing of cryptocurrency and stablecoins, that we would have heeded the common sense of the American people who would have said: Do not ratify the corruption that is going on in our Capitol. I don't think that is too much for the American people to ask for. I hope my colleagues will reconsider their position, and we will have the chance to have a proper debate and a proper negotiation on this bill. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I was necessarily absent from rollcall vote No. 297, confirmation of Brett Shumate, of Virginia, to be an Assistant Attorney General. Had I been present for the vote I would have voted nay. I was necessarily absent from rollcall vote No. 298, the motion to invoke cloture on David Fotouhi to be Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Had I been present for the vote I would have voted nay. I was necessarily absent from rollcall vote No. 299, confirmation of David Fotouhi to be Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Had I been present for the vote I would have voted nay.

Mr. BENNET

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

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, on June 1, the Boulder chapter of Run for Their Lives gathered at the Pearl Street Mall for their solemn weekly routine. Every week since Hamas's October 7, 2023, terrorist attack, they have shown up to march peacefully in solidarity with the hostages that Hamas kidnapped and continues to hold, over 600 days after that fateful day. They come to sing songs, tell stories, and read the names of hostages to affirm for them and for us and for the world that those hostages have not been forgotten, that they never will be forgotten. June 1 started like any other early-summer Boulder Sunday--cool and clear and promising the kind of bluebird day we love in Colorado. The group gathered on the eve of the Jewish holiday of Shavuot for their memorial march. One man, however, was thinking only of violence and hate. Amid his yells of ``End Zionists,'' he unleashed a makeshift flamethrower and launched Molotov cocktails to burn the marchers. He inflicted his terror directly on at least 12 innocent people, including a Holocaust survivor in her late eighties who survived the unfathomable war in Europe only to face anti-Semitic evil once again--only this time in the United States. If there is any doubt that this was an anti-Semitic hate crime and an act of terror, the attacker has told investigators that ``he wanted to kill all Zionist people and wished they were all dead.'' He said he specifically targeted this group and that he researched and planned the attack for more than a year. He did not have some intellectual point that he was trying to make about Israel's politics. He was not trying to improve the lives of Palestinians. He simply wanted to kill Jews by burning them in the most painful way possible, and he knew where to find them--at the Pearl Street Mall, marching peacefully on behalf of hostages a terrorist group stole from their families. America's Founders built this country on the tenets of religious freedom and tolerance. In 1790, George Washington wrote to Rhode Island's Jewish community that the America he was building would give ``to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.'' This letter affirmed that the Jewish people had a place in the United States--a rare refuge amid Europe's thousand-year pogrom. The United States, like all countries, has never always lived up to our lofty ideals, but it is our commitment to trying, to striving to become the city on the hill we proclaim to be that has long made this country a beacon to the world and different from almost all other countries in the world. That is why my mother immigrated here rather than somewhere else in Europe or the Western Hemisphere. It is why the world's weary dreamers still give up everything they have to seek a better life in the United States rather than crossing the Gobi Desert for China or the Eurasian Steppe for Russia. But in recent years, American anti-Semitism has reached unprecedented levels. The Anti-Defamation League tracked over 9,300 anti-Semitic incidents across the United States last year--the highest number in 46 years of tracking. In 2024, anti-Semites made bomb threats against and vandalized synagogues, including in Colorado. They assaulted congregants at Jewish institutions. They targeted Jewish students with anti-Semitic threats. They protested Israeli policy and Zionism at synagogues as if American Jews are responsible for decisions made by a foreign government thousands of miles away. American anti-Semitism tends to spike when Israeli-Palestinian conflict flares up, such as following Hamas's May 2021 and October 2023 attacks. But we cannot forget that anti-Semitism is the world's oldest hatred. It long predates the Holocaust, let alone the October 7 or the recent DC and Boulder attacks. As Ukrainian Jewish author Vasily Grossman--the first journalist to see the Nazi death camp Treblinka--wrote in the mid-20th century, ``Antisemitism has been as strong in the age of atomic reactors and computers as in the age of oil-lamps, sailing-boats, and spinning- wheels.'' Anti-Semitism--even American anti-Semitism--is an ancient prejudice indeed; it is not some kind of knee-jerk response to Israeli policy. Anti-Semites in America do not aim to make profound points or philosophical points about Israel by throwing Molotov cocktails at elderly Coloradans or gunning down a young couple leaving an event about Middle East peacekeeping in our Nation's Capital. No. These anti- Semites use events in the Middle East as an excuse to express their latent anti-Semitism, their medieval hatred of Jews, who they blame for some swath of society's ills. They want to harm Jews, to add more tragedy to the family histories of the people whose collective chronicle is already overstocked with victims, to say the least. The Boulder attack, the recent DC shooting, and the thousands of anti-Semitic incidents across the United States over the last few years are a direct result of anti-Semitic rhetoric that has been left unchecked. Even before this attack, American Jews wondered whether they should hide their Star of David necklaces before leaving the house, whether Friday Shabbat service will be safe, and whether their synagogues will have to hire still more security officials. This omnipresent fear of anti-Semitic violence makes it impossible for Jews to feel safe in a non-Jewish America and in a non-Jewish world. And this fear produces behaviors like hiding one's Star of David or avoiding Jewish events on a college campus where a dean says the school can't guarantee Jewish students' safety. That amounts to what the historian Simon Schama has called a ``passive deprivation of basic civil rights.'' Yet how else are American Jews supposed to react when American anti- Semitism has reached record levels? When a terrorist massacres congregants at a Pittsburgh synagogue? When elderly women in Boulder, CO, can't march on behalf of innocent hostages without being targeted by fire? It is long past time that all American political and community leaders come together to affirm that this fear is unacceptable and that we must fight together the anti-Semitic hate behind it. We must use our voices and our power, whether in the Halls of Congress or in our own communities, to counter anti-Semitism in both words and action. We must speak up because we know the dangers of failing to do so. We must stand with the Jewish community for freedom of speech and religion and against fear, because as Grossman knew and as he wrote, ``life can be defined as freedom. Life is freedom.'' And ``freedom is the fundamental principle of life.'' I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, you never know what you are going to find these days when you are reflecting on the Trump administration and our oversight responsibilities as the Congress. It is true that things have changed. Some people might call me old- fashioned for thinking this way, but I think we were a lot better off when we had Presidents who took it as a matter of course that they shouldn't use their office to enrich themselves, and they should put behind them conflicts of interest that raise questions about whether or not they are serving their own interests or their families' interests or the interests of the people of the United States. That is why Ronald Reagan put, I think, his wealth, which was considerable, into a blind trust. Jimmy Carter, I think, sold maybe his farm or put that in a trust. I realize it is part of Donald Trump's political charm that he wants to wear his corruption on his sleeve, but that doesn't mean that we have to go along with it, even if some people are entertained by it, which I am not. And we have a great example of thinking about our responsibility versus his complete lack of integrity when it comes to the service of his public duties and his private interests. That is the bill--the so-called GENIUS Act--that is on the floor of the Senate right now, where we are considering whether or not to regulate stablecoins, which are part of the cryptocurrency universe that is new to all of us, certainly in this Chamber and across the country. I believe very strongly that no President and no Vice President, no Member of Congress, no high-ranking official of our government should be in the business of issuing cryptocurrency, including the stablecoin. And they shouldn't be in the business of pumping them up like some sort of speculator, which is what we are seeing happen, sometimes outside the White House or in the White House. I saw, the other day, that the President was having a dinner at Mar- a-Lago to reward the people who had been bidding up his meme coins, and they even came to dinner, although he apparently didn't really show for that dinner. But the legislation we have in front of us would be the first regulations of stablecoins that have ever been done. I think, as part of that, it would be very appropriate for us to say that the President should get out of this business and that any President should be out of the business of issuing their own coins. It is a weird part of the nature of this asset--this new digital asset--that it is very volatile. The meme coins rise and they fall as part of their price, and the stablecoins are used as a way of transacting around that volatility. But the volatility, every single day, is still captured in this market, and it just seems like a crazy moment when we are living in a time when a President could influence his own net worth to the tune of billions of dollars, just based on pumping up the value of digital currency that he has put out there in the world with his name or that somebody else has put out there in the world with his name. That is why, yesterday, I offered an amendment to the bill, to the GENIUS Act, that would preclude any President--this President or any other President or any Vice President--from issuing stablecoins. I hope we will consider that amendment on the floor of the Senate. I hope we will vote to pass it, if we are, indeed, going to pass this legislation. And I hope we will have other amendments we consider as well. I think that the questions that are at issue here from an ethics point of view, from a corruption point of view, go far beyond just the stablecoin. They go to cryptocurrency, generally, and what the President is doing to inflate the value of coins that are issued in his name, whether he has issued them or whether he hasn't. I look forward to the debate that we are going to have. I think this is an opportunity for us to say that we want to elevate the requirements that each one of us has agreed to live under, as Members of this body and people elected to act in the public interest. I believe the President and his Vice President should face the same standard and the same scrutiny. That is why I offered the amendment that I have. I hope that, as our colleagues consider the debate that we are going to have, that others will come to the floor with their ideas to strengthen this legislation and make sure that people don't abuse their public office for their own personal economic gain. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BENNET

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

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I call for the regular order.

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I offer my amendment to prevent the President and the Vice President from using their public office for personal enrichment. Donald Trump has already benefited enormously from his ability to issue stablecoins, as everybody in the world knows. His World Liberty Financial, in which he and his family have an overwhelming stake, issued a stablecoin just the other month. This stablecoin was chosen by companies throughout the Middle East to facilitate a $2 billion investment in Binance. The President's company will now reap interest in trading fees on billions of dollars while also raising concerns about undue influence and our national security. We shouldn't have to wonder if the President of the United States is favoring the interests of a foreign nation or a private crypto exchange like Binance because he stands to personally profit. While this amendment specifically addresses the issuance and endorsement of stablecoins, I believe this prohibition should extend to all digital assets, including the President's meme coin. In other words, I believe the President and the Vice President and everybody who is a Member of this body and in the House of Representatives should not be in the business of speculating and issuing cryptocurrency-- stablecoins, meme coins, any of them. The Senate should not continue with the GENIUS Act unless the opportunities for corruption and conflict of interest on the part of executives are fully addressed. Boulder, Colorado Attack

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I want to thank my colleague from Iowa very much, Mr. Chairman, for your acknowledging the horrific terrorist attack in Boulder yesterday. I will be out here later with my colleague Senator Hickenlooper to talk about it at greater length. People were there week after week after week to mark the horrendous hostage taking that has occurred in Gaza and that Hamas has refused to address--hostages only Hamas can release. This war could end tomorrow if Hamas released the hostages. People all over this country and all over the world have marched in solidarity for our hostages. Yesterday, the people in Boulder, CO, were savagely attacked by a terrorist while they were expressing their First Amendment rights. That should never happen in this country. Again, I thank the chairman, my colleague, and my friend from Iowa for coming to the floor to discuss that today. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I just want to thank the leader on behalf of the people of Colorado and the people of Boulder for his remarks of concern. I share his commitment to making sure these sorts of terrorist attacks don't happen in our country when people are expressing their free speech rights. It is not surprising to me that the leader would be one of the very first people to the floor to raise the voices of the people of Colorado in this moment and the people of his State. Thank you, Leader.

Mr. BENNET

Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I, too, am here on the floor today to oppose the SAVE Act. Today, Americans register to vote in a variety of ways, typically set by each State in this country, but Federal law requires that Americans attest to citizenship under penalty of perjury. In Colorado, you can register online; you can register in person; you can register through the mail. It can be as easy as providing your Social Security number and signature, which every American has, through the secretary of state's website. Alternatively, the SAVE Act would change that by requiring that all American citizens, whether registering for the first time or updating their registration, to present proof of citizenship in person, largely in the form of a passport or a birth certificate. In other words, government issued driver's licenses and military and Tribal identifications would not satisfy the bill's requirements. The SAVE Act would severely restrict online voter registration and mail-in registration and eliminate voter registration drives altogether. It would make it harder or even impossible for up to 69 million married American women who have changed their names, because their last name doesn't match the one on their birth certificate. Meanwhile, half of Americans don't even have a passport. How are they going to register under this law? They can't. Over 60 million Americans who live in rural areas--now they are going to have to drive miles and miles and miles, hours out of their way, to stand in line at a local election agency. The SAVE Act does nothing to make it easier to cast a ballot; it only succeeds in making it harder for Americans to register to vote and to exercise their rights. This is not theoretical. Kansas tried to implement its own State- level SAVE Act in 2013, with disastrous results. The law blocked over 30,000 potential registrants in just 2 years--about 12 percent of all voter registrations during the period. State officials acknowledged in court that over 99 percent of affected voters were U.S. citizens. Now, even Kansas's Republican secretary of state, who championed the bill when he was a State legislator, has warned against it, saying: It didn't work out so well. I would say so. About 12 percent of the people who tried to register couldn't. Compare those 30,000 Kansans who attempted to register and were denied to the 30 people--30 people--the 30 noncitizens who reportedly voted in the 2016 election nationwide. That is about 0.0001 percent of all votes cast. If there ever was one, this is a solution in search of a problem, and the only solution doesn't even work. It only makes it harder for law- abiding Americans to register to vote or patriotic Americans to register to vote. Perhaps it would be better if this bill were modeled after the system that we have in Colorado. We have set the gold standard in my State. It is a system that actually encourages people to vote in a fraud-free system. In Colorado, we are the first State in America to complete a risk-limiting audit, the gold standard for verifying the integrity of election results to begin with, and it entails counting and comparing a representative sample of ballots to the reported result. To prevent hacking, none of our voting machines are attached to the internet. We require county clerks to use two-factor authentication to access voter databases. And once a vote is cast, a bipartisan team of election judges in each county checks every signature against the copy in the database for any discrepancies. All election officials and judges with access to the tabulation process must pass a Colorado Bureau of Investigation background check. Colorado has spent years implementing top-tier cyber security measures and audits to prevent hackers from interfering with our electoral process. We have one of the most secure election systems of any State in the country, and because Coloradans have trust in our gold standard system, we have some of the highest voter turnout in America. That is the model we should be using across the country, in my view. Instead of wasting time and taxpayer dollars on the SAVE Act, Congress should be implementing Colorado's practices all across the country. I yield the floor to my colleague from Rhode Island. Thank you very much for his leadership in bringing the Nation's attention to this issue today.