John Kennedy

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I want to speak briefly about two subjects. They are different. They are both important, but they are different. Let me start with the reconciliation bill, which President Trump and others called the One Big Beautiful Bill. I continue to go through the bill, and every time I do, I am impressed. This is a breathtaking bill in the sense that it covers so many subjects. I think each of us could spend hours talking about this bill. I will just hit the highlights. This is one of the most far-reaching pieces of legislation that this body will ever pass. We extended the 2017 tax cuts--no small feat in itself. Had we not done that, the American people would have suffered under a $4.3 trillion tax increase. So we stopped that tax increase. Some of my friends and colleagues talk about, well, all you did was stop the tax increase on billionaires. That is nonsense. That is nonsense on a stick. Unless your soup of the day is gin, you know that that is a lie. Half of that tax increase would have hit working men and working women and working families in this country. The other half would have hit our small businesses, and, yes, some of our large businesses. We stopped that. We made some of those tax cuts permanent. We cut taxes on tips. In this bill, we cut taxes on overtime. We cut taxes on Social Security. We cut taxes on car loans. We expanded a tax credit for childcare to help moms and dads pay for the childcare so they can work. We increased the child tax credit. We increased the standard deduction, and that is going to take effect immediately. We funded school choice. For years and years and years, I have tried--we all have tried, many of us have tried--to provide the American people--moms and dads--with school choice. This bill did it. I went to a public school. I am proud of that. But competition makes all of us better. I can go to my overpriced Capitol Hill apartment or Capitol Hill grocery store and choose from six or seven types of mayonnaise. Why shouldn't we give parents--moms and dads--choices for their kids' education? We are doing that with the school choice portion of this bill. We increase money for the border, and we increase money for defense. We also address the problem in Medicaid. And I have been very disappointed because some commentators have said that we are going to throw off from the Medicaid rolls, I have read, anywhere from 10 to 12 million people. The implication in some of these articles and some of these comments is that we are just going to look at the Medicaid rolls and go through and say: You are gone. We can't afford you. That is not what this bill does. The first thing you have to realize is that, actually, Medicaid is not going to be cut at all under this bill. Under our bill that we just passed, our spending on Medicaid over the next 10 years is going to go up 20 percent, so nobody is cutting Medicaid. There are some people, as a result of the new provisions that we have put into law, who will no longer be eligible for Medicaid and will no longer get Medicaid. But they weren't entitled to get it in the first place. So when you say: Well, you are throwing people off of Medicaid-- they weren't entitled to it in the first place. You are not entitled to Medicaid if you are making $200,000 a year and you didn't tell the truth when you signed up for Medicaid in your State and your State didn't verify your status. But let me give you one example. CMS just put out a report. Our bill is going to change the law so that 2.8 million Americans--the CBO says, like, we are throwing 10 or 12 million Americans off of Medicaid. I will just give you this one example: 2.8 million of those Americans who will lose Medicaid are doubledippers. They signed up twice. We have 1.2 million people on the Medicaid rolls who are signed up in two States, and the American taxpayer is paying twice. As you know, Mr. President, well--you were a great Governor; you were a Governor and a damn good one--most States use managed care, and they pay per Medicaid person. So if a State is paying, let's say--I will pick a number--$8,000 per Medicaid patient per year to the healthcare organization to provide their care, and that person is signed up in two States, they are doubledipping, and it is costing the American taxpayer two $8,000 payments a year. That is cheating. So from one perspective, you are throwing these people off of Medicaid--they weren't entitled to doubledip in the first place. CMS also came out with a report. By ``CMS,'' I mean the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which is the Federal Agency that administers Medicare and Medicaid. CMS has also found that there are 1.6 million people who are on Medicaid today who are receiving both Medicaid and ObamaCare. Well, what is ObamaCare? I will refresh everyone's memory. Medicaid is supposed to be for the poor and disabled, and Medicare is for the elderly, and a lot of other Americans have health insurance through their job. But there are a certain number of Americans who don't have health insurance because they are not old enough for Medicare, they are not poor enough for Medicaid, and maybe their employer doesn't offer health insurance. So they can go to an exchange--we call them the ObamaCare exchange--and buy health insurance. Now, President Obama and some of my colleagues--I wasn't here then, but when we passed the ObamaCare, the ObamaCare exchanges, the Affordable Care Act, we were told that health insurance would be cheaper, and we were told it would be more accessible. It has been neither. We were also told if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. That wasn't true either. But the point is that we have a number of Americans who, if they don't qualify for Medicare, they don't qualify for Medicaid, they don't get insurance through their employer, they go to the ObamaCare exchanges. CMS found we have got 1.6 million people who are getting both health insurance through the ObamaCare exchanges--which we subsidize, taxpayers do--and through Medicaid. That is called doubledipping. It is illegal. CBO can put out all the reports that they want to saying: Oh, you are throwing all these people off Medicaid. And technically, they are right, but they are not eligible to be on Medicaid. I just gave you an example, 2.8 million people who are doubledipping. It is illegal to doubledip. It is immoral to doubledip. It is unfair to taxpayers to doubledip. All our bill does is say you can't doubledip. Cheating is wrong. Is that throwing people off of Medicaid? Technically, yes. But, once again, as the other provisions in this bill also do, we are taking people off Medicaid who weren't eligible for it in the first place. As a result of these 2.8 million people, I think CMS--I am looking for their figure. I think it cost the American taxpayer, because of these 2.8 million folks who are doubledipping, $14 billion a year--$14 billion a year over a 10-year window, which is the horizon that we use. That is $140 billion that we are going to save, and that savings is going to go back into Medicaid to make it even stronger. That is just one example of how much of--not much, but--well, yes, much of the reporting on our bill is misleading.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, also, with me today is Mr. Will McCarthy, one of my colleagues from my Senate office. Today, we are going to start talking about and voting on the rescission package, and I want to talk about that for a few minutes. As the Presiding Officer knows, under our Constitution, Congress passes a budget. We send that budget to the President of the United States, whoever that might be, and the President executes, or implements, our budget. On occasion, under Federal statute, the President has the authority, after we have passed a budget in Congress, to look at the budget and say: You know, I don't need all this money to accomplish the goals that Congress established and instructed me to accomplish. So the President can contact us and say: Congress, I would like you to rescind some of the spending in the budget that you sent to me. It is called a rescission bill or a rescission package. President Trump has sent us a rescission bill, or a rescission package, asking the U.S. Congress to cut the budget by roughly $9 billion, and that is what we are going to start voting on today. Now, $9 billion is a lot of money--except when you compare it to the overall Federal budget. Nine billion dollars, despite the fact that it is a bucketload of money, is one-tenth of 1 percent of the Federal budget--one-tenth of 1 percent of the Federal budget. It gives you an idea of how big the Federal budget is. I think most people--most adults, anyway--understand that in life, what you say doesn't really matter. What you say doesn't really matter. It is what you do that demonstrates what you believe. That is certainly true in politics, and that is certainly true in Washington, DC. Ignore what anybody in Washington, DC, says. Ignore it. If you want to understand their behavior, look at their behavior. In Washington, DC, as in life, what you do is what you believe, not what you say. What you do is what you believe, and everything else is just cottage cheese. Now, President Trump--whether you voted for him or not and whether you like him or not--ran on a platform of reducing the size of government, and the people elected him. Since day one, the President, if you have paid attention to the news, has been working very hard to reduce government spending, and he has reduced a lot. He started out with the DOGE program, with Mr. Elon Musk. Mr. Musk, of course, has left, but the quest to reduce government spending--wasteful government spending, which I call spending porn--continues. Every Republican in the U.S. Senate has voiced approval of what the President has done. Every Republican--every one of my colleagues, myself included--has said to the President: Attaboy, Mr. President. Go get `em. Keep issuing those Executive orders. Reduce the spending. We are spending too much money. We have got a $37 trillion debt. Keep going, Mr. President. The President has, but he has been doing it through Executive order. There is only so much you can do through Executive order. An Executive order, issued by a President, expires when the President is no longer in office. The only way to permanently reduce spending is to have Congress act, and that is what the President is asking us to do in this rescission bill. What you do is what you believe, and everything else is just cottage cheese. The rescission package that the President has sent over--we are going to start considering it today. And after listening in some cases for years but certainly for the last 100-plus days since President Trump has been in office--after listening to my Republican colleagues talk about the importance of reducing spending, it is gut check time. It is gut check time because what you do is what you believe, not what you say, and now my colleagues and I have an opportunity to really support the President. Now, I don't know if this bill is going to pass. I do not know if it is going to pass. I mean, I have heard a lot of wailing and the gnashing of teeth and whining and that civilization is going to melt if we cut one-tenth of 1 percent of the budget. That is coming from some of my Democratic colleagues, and they are entitled to their point of view, but I want to put this in context. After all of us on my side of the aisle have told the world that we need to reduce spending, if we vote against this rescission package and refuse to reduce spending by one-tenth of 1 percent of the budget, we ought to hide our heads in a bag. We ought to hide our heads in a bag. What kind of spending is the President asking us to reduce, to eliminate? That is important because not all government spending is wasteful, but a lot of it is. That is why I call it spending porn. I am going to read you some of the appropriations that the President is asking us to eliminate from the current budget, and you be the judge. Let the American people decide. The President is asking us to eliminate $5.1 million of taxpayer money in the American budget, the Federal budget, that is there to ``strengthen the resilience of queer global movements.'' The President is asking us to rescind $6 million for media organizations and civic life for Palestinians. The President, in light of our $37 trillion budget deficit, is asking us to reduce spending--to reduce a program--in the amount of $3.9 million for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex population in the Western Balkans. The President is suggesting that we eliminate a program of $1 million for voter ID programs in Haiti. This is your money, folks. The President is asking us to reduce the budget by $3 million which is appropriated for ``sexual reproductive health in Venezuela''; $3 million for circumcision, vasectomies, and condoms in Zambia. I didn't make this stuff up; it is in the budget. There is $3 million for ``Sesame Street'' in Iraq; $833,000 for transgender people, sex workers, and their clients in Nepal; $882,000 for social media mentorship in Serbia and Belarus; $3.6 million for pastry cooking classes, cyber cafes, and dance focus groups for male prostitutes in Haiti. How many Americans do you know think we should be spending their money to fund male prostitutes in Haiti? But there it is in our budget--bigger than Dallas--and the President is saying: Cut it out. We have $6.2 million for Venezuelan migrants in Colombia and $500,000 to buy Rwanda electric buses. I love Rwanda. If they want electric buses, they have got a budget. There is $300,000 for a pride parade in Lesotho; $300,000 for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex advocacy in Uganda; $500,000 for biodiversity in Peru. I could keep going. I could go the rest of the day and night. I know what you are thinking: How in God's name--on God's green Earth--did this spending porn get in the Federal Government's budget? Why would Congress put it there? Well, I am going to tell you why: We didn't. When we pass a budget, we pass budgets based on programs or agendas or line items. We don't put in there that we would like to spend $5.1 million on strengthening the resilience of queer global movements. We appropriate money by Agency or line item. For example, we might appropriate money for the Economic Support Fund or, if you look at our budget, you will see money appropriated for the United States Institute of Peace. If you look at our budget, you will see money that Congress has appropriated for migration and refugee assistance. Then this money goes to the bureaucracy, and the bureaucracy takes the money that we have appropriated, for example, to the Economic Support Fund, and they decide to give it to their friends--usually nongovernmental organizations--to fund these nonsensical items that I just spent a few minutes reading. Congress didn't vote to spend $3 million on sexual reproductive health in Venezuela; we voted for a program that the bureaucrats took and spent on sexual health, reproductive health, in Venezuela. That is not an excuse, but I get that question all the time: Why did Congress vote to do this? We didn't. The bureaucracy did. It is a giant, rogue beast. The point is, Trump caught it, and his people caught it, and the President is saying: Get rid of it. With all of these programs, this spending porn, we would be better off taking this money and spending it on scratch tickets and blackjack. We would be better off taking all of this money that I just talked about and spending it on scratch tickets and blackjack. At least taxpayers might have a chance of getting a return. That is how out of control this is. But if you listen to some of my colleagues, they say: Oh, my God. If we cut $9 billion--if we cut this spending porn-- civilization is going to melt. There is one other thing in our budget that the President is asking us to cut. He is asking us to cut a little over $1 billion for what I will call public broadcasting. When I say ``public broadcasting,'' I am talking about the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. I am talking about the Public Broadcasting Service, or PBS. I am talking about National Public Radio--NPR, as we call it. We spend anywhere from $500 to $600 million a year on public broadcasting. Why do we do that? Well, we started doing it years ago-- at least 50 years ago--at a time when there were only three television stations and a few radio stations and newspapers. A lot of folks in rural areas didn't get the television stations. They didn't get any news at all. They might live far enough away from a major city that they didn't even have a daily newspaper. So Congress said: You know, we want everybody to know what is going on in the world. We are going to start public broadcasting, and we are going to give them money every year, and they won't have to run ads because we are going to spend taxpayer money to give to these radio stations and television stations. That was 50 years ago. Today, American people have access to all forms of media: streaming, cable TV, network TV, TikTok, Twitter, newspapers--those that are left. No one is in a news desert anymore. So why are we spending money on public broadcasting, $500 million a year? The other factor is, it is undeniable that Public Broadcasting has become political. Unless you have been a huge disappointment to your parents, you understand if you listen to Public Broadcasting, that it is representing today one political point of view. The president of NPR--no one would mistake her for Walter Cronkite, I can assure you--her name is Kathleen Maher. This is her position. She is supposed to be delivering the news objectively, but this is what she has said: Trump is a deranged racist sociopath. The president and CEO of NPR thinks that America is ``addicted to white supremacy.'' She has denounced the use of words ``boy'' and ``girl.'' She says that is ``erasing language for non-binary people.'' She contends that the United States was founded on the basis of ``black plunder and white democracy.'' That is who is running the show over there. She is entitled to her beliefs. This is America. You are entitled to believe what you want. NPR and PBS and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting are entitled to publish and broadcast what they publish, but not on the taxpayers' dime. When we owe $37 trillion--and we really owe that money--we have no business spending half a billion dollars a year, giving it to any form of media. We don't fund CNN. We don't fund FOX News. We don't fund newspapers. Why are we funding PBS and NPR and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting? All the President is saying: I don't want you to do that anymore, Congress. I don't want you to fund any form of media. PBS, for example, is right to publish what they want, but Congress shouldn't give them taxpayer money to do it. Let them go raise money in the private sector. The President is right. The President is absolutely right. That is all this rescission bill is going to do. It is going to bring a little bit of sanity back to our appropriations process. I am going to end on this note. I am going to end as I began: What you do is what you believe, and everything else is just cottage cheese. I have been here 10 years. Every one of those 10 years, but especially in the last 100 days since President Trump was reelected and started talking about reducing spending, I have listened to all of my Republican colleagues encourage the President and say: That is great. We have got to reduce spending. We have got to reduce spending. Well, here is your chance. Here is your chance. It is gut-check time. You either believe in reducing spending, or you don't. You either support spending porn, or you don't. We are going to find out who does and who doesn't here in about 3 or 4 hours. I yield the floor.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following interns from my office be granted floor privileges until July 16, 2025: Charles Roemer, Melissa Blomquist, Caroline Garrett, Mackenzie Connaughton, Lindsay Moore, Madeline Champagne, and Mary Quoyeser.

Mr. KENNEDY

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

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask that the scheduled rollcall vote begin immediately.

Mr. KENNEDY

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

Mr. KENNEDY

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

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I want to talk about just a few subjects briefly today, in no particular order. I want to talk first about Russia and the war with Ukraine. Now, regardless of how you feel about the war in Ukraine, I think most fairminded people can agree on two things. No. 1, Vladimir Putin, who runs Russia--not the people of Russia but their leadership--is a thug. He is empowered. He has blood under his fingernails. He can't be trusted. The second thing that I think most fairminded Americans can agree on is that we would all like to see the war ended. President Trump has tried, and, frankly, President Putin has treated our President--as I have said before on the Senate floor, Putin has treated our President like President Trump has taken the bullet train to chump town. He says all the right things when he talks to our President, and then he does the opposite. I think he has disrespected America--``he'' meaning President Putin--and I think he has disrespected President Trump. I think Ukraine is willing to negotiate a reasonable settlement, but it takes two to tango, and we are not going to have a settlement until President Putin decides it is in his best interest to stop the war, not in Russia's best interest because I don't think he cares about his people. I think the war will stop when Putin thinks it is in his best interest, and I don't think he is going to think it is in his best interest until he feels the pressure because dealing with Putin is like dealing with most tyrants: It is like hand- feeding a shark. You can't reason with them. You have to make them feel the pain. A lot of people think of Russia and think of Putin as this gigantic country with a lot of wealth and power, and that is not really the case. Yes, they have nuclear weapons, but, actually, the Russian economy is pretty small. The Russian economy--for example, the European economy is about $50 trillion. That is their GDP. The Russian economy is only about $2 trillion. New York State, in America, has a bigger economy than Russia, and I think we need to keep that in mind. Russia's economy is also not terribly diversified. It is mostly oil. Putin relies on oil revenues for about a third of his budget. Now, why am I saying all this? Because the Russian economy is not in great shape. They are spending almost all of their money--about 7 percent of their GDP--to fuel their war machine. The Russian economy wasn't that great, frankly, to begin with. If you sit down and just look at the numbers and the statistics, you will see that, with the Russian economy, at one point, inflation was through the roof. At one point, I think they had 21 percent inflation. I think, if you look at the Russian economy, you will see that many of the commentators in Russia think that--and this is coming from the Russian commentators, not from others. They think that Russia might be on the verge of going into a recession. If you look at the numbers coming out of Russia, you will see that manufacturing in Russia is declining. You will see a lot of the consumers--people, ordinary people in Russia--tightening their belts. Inflation, which I alluded to, remains high, and the Russian budget is strained. The price of oil is down. Remember, I said Putin depends on oil for about 30 percent to a third of his revenue, and the price of oil is down. Their growth model in Russia--their model of sustenance--is based on the war, and they are starting to feel the effects of that. For example, in the first quarter of this year, the Russian GDP grew 1.4 percent. You might be thinking: Well, that is not bad. It is not great, but it is not bad. In the fourth quarter of 2024, though, if you look at the numbers, the Russian economy grew 4.5 percent. So, clearly, it is slowing. Once again, remember, I said the Russian economy is based on oil. Why is it slowing? Well, No. 1, the price of oil is down. We know that. No. 2, Russia is spending all of its money fighting the war with Ukraine, which has hurt other parts of its economy. The point I am trying to make is, when you are dealing with a tyrant like Putin and you are trying to bring him to the negotiating table, what you have to do is get him down and choke him, and the way to get President Putin down and choke him is through his cashflow. Putin--and, remember, I am not talking about the good people in Russia. I am talking about their leadership. I am talking about Vladimir Putin, the thug. Putin is only able to prosecute his war through cashflow generated by his sale of oil. That is the only way. Without that cashflow from oil, he can't continue. We need to cut off his money. We need to cut off his sale of oil. Now, we already have sanctions on oil, and Europe has sanctions on Russia, but Russia has figured out how to evade those sanctions and continue to sell its oil. For example, India is buying a lot of Russia's oil. China is buying a lot of Russia's oil, but we can stop that. We have a bill--87 of us have signed on--that would apply what is called secondary sanctions on Russia and not only sanctions; our bill would not only sanction Russia and its sale of oil, but it would sanction everybody who buys Russian oil, a big difference, a big difference. It would say to those who want to buy Russian oil: If you want to buy Russian oil, have at it--knock yourself out--but you are not going to be able to do business with America, and you are not going to be able to use the American dollar, which is the world's currency, to do business in America. It will put Putin on his knees within 3 months, and he won't have any choice but to come to the bargaining table. Now, President Trump has been very patient. President Biden wasn't patient; he was giving. I remember when President Biden said to Putin: Well, you know, we don't want you to go into Ukraine, but if it is just a little excursion, it might be OK. I remember that. What do you think Putin did? Do you remember hand- feeding a shark? He went right into Ukraine. President Trump, on the other hand, has really tried to be rational and negotiate with Putin and say: Look, we need to have an amicable solution to satisfy both sides. Ukraine is willing. Putin has done nothing but embarrass our President and our country. The time has come to put Russia on its knees. I hate to see it for the Russian people, but the time has come to put Putin on his knees, to get him down and choke him. The only way you are going to do that is to cut off his cashflow, and the only way you are going to cut off his cashflow is to cut off his oil sales because that is at least a third--and probably 40 percent--of his money. We have no choice. Otherwise, this war could go on forever. We have the bill locked, loaded, and ready to go. We are waiting for President Trump to give us the high sign because we want to stay together. The President is the one who is trying to negotiate the peace, but I hope President Trump will seriously consider letting us pull the trigger because it is the only thing--it is the only thing-- that is going to get Vladimir Putin to the table. I wish the war weren't like that. There are just some people--I don't know why they make it to Heaven. I am going to ask. But there are some people in this world, they are not sick; they are not misunderstood; they are not mixed up. It is not really that their mom or dad didn't love them enough. They are just bad people. They are. And some of them run countries, and one of them is Vladimir Putin. So let's go do what we have to do.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2772 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, we just spent 13 hours on motions to commit. I am not blaming my Democratic colleagues because we had to agree to it. But anybody with a brain above a single-cell organism knows that a motion to commit has no chance of passing. So, basically, we have been standing around for 13 hours. We might as well have just been standing around sucking on our teeth. Now, I would like to ask for order in this Chamber. At least we can have that.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, in this bill, $1 billion is set aside to be spent by September 30, 2027, to carry out the Defense Production Act. That is it. That is all there is. Now, I am not a big fan of government-directed industrialization. Government-directed industrialization is when government, with its superior instincts and unfathomable judgment, decides to pick winners and losers in the private sector. This business gets some money; but you, Ms. Businesswoman, you can't have the money. I am against that for two reasons. No. 1, it is immoral. It is unfair to people who don't get the money, the gift from government. And, No. 2, when government does it, when it picks winners and losers, government consistently picks losers. Now, I was against it in the prior administration, and, just recently, in my subcommittee, we had a hearing where the prior administration handed out $90 billion in the last 76 days of its administration in gifts and loans to entities in the private sector. And I raised fresh hell. And now we are about to do it again--a billion dollars. Now I am--and that is all it says, a billion dollars to be spent, period. Now, I have been told that the Secretary of Energy and the Secretary of the Interior are going to describe, in their unfettered discretion, who is going to get this money in the private sector, and they are both two good men. I know both of those Secretaries; I voted for them. They are total ballers. I love them to death. But when I am in Washington, I live by this adage: Trust in God, but tie up your camel. Trust in God, but tie up your camel. This bill will say they can give these gifts and grants to whomever they want, but Congress has to approve them. Now, about--I don't know--about an hour ago, I got a call from one of my supporters. And you know what he said to me? He said: Kennedy, for your own good, you need to pull down this amendment. You have to pull down this amendment. Kennedy, for your own good, you have to pull down this amendment. And you know what I told him? I said Scooter--I said, Scooter, there are only two things I have to do in this world: be cool and die, and I am not pulling down this amendment. It wasn't right when it was done in the prior administration; it is not right now that we are in charge. This is Congress's job, and, by God, we ought to do it. And I reserve my time.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, how much time do I have?

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, my esteemed colleague and I--

Mr. KENNEDY. Thank you, Scooter--I mean, Mr. President. Mr. President, I appreciate my colleagues' support. I don't mean any disrespect to anybody. This town operates on two wrongs don't make it right, but they do make it even. It is time that Congress have a say in how the money is being spent. It doesn't say the money can't be spent; it just says Congress gets to approve it.

Mr. KENNEDY. Excuse me, Mr. President.

Mr. KENNEDY. Thank you, sir. Pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, I move to waive the point of order, reminding the body that I am not striking the spending--reminding the body that I am not striking the spending. I am just asking Congress to approve it. I ask for the yeas and nays. Vote on Motion

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, as you know, as we all know, many of our teachers in America come out-of-pocket to pay for school supplies. In 2002, 23 years ago, we allowed teachers to deduct $250 when they come out-of-pocket. My amendment would raise that deduction from $250 to $600. Teachers, right now, spend an average of $650 out of their own pockets, so we would allow them to deduct that instead of the amount we set in 2002. I ask a favorable consideration of my amendment. This will just let teachers break even for coming out-of-pocket.

Mr. KENNEDY. Do I have any time left, Mr. President?

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, and on behalf of all of the teachers in America and the waiver provisions of applicable budget resolutions, I move, on behalf of all the teachers in America, to waive all applicable sections of that act and applicable budget resolutions for purposes of the pending amendment--and, once again, on behalf of our teachers--and I ask for the yeas and nays. Vote on Motion

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2790 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, the Federal Government has a list of dead people. This bill would require those who administer Medicaid to check the Federal Government's dead people list before they pay the Medicaid payment out--duh. This bill, unfortunately, says that those who administer Medicaid don't have to check before they cut a check to see if the dead person is dead until January 1, 2028--duh. My amendment would move it up to January 1, 2027. So we would pay fewer dead people who keep cashing the checks.

Mr. KENNEDY. They wouldn't--duh.

Mr. KENNEDY. I accept a voice vote. Duh. Vote on Amendment No. 2790

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2723 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, as you know, when we passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, we capped State and local taxes at $10,000. I liked it then; I like it now. The bill before us dramatically raises that cap. I think it is a mistake. I think it is bad policy. But I realize that my instincts are not infallible. Some people don't realize that, but mine aren't. And for that reason--I respect this entire body, and I respect everybody in it. I don't think my intellect is superior, and I don't think my instincts are infallible. For that reason, I ask to withdraw my amendment, whatever the hell the number was. The amendment (No. 2723) was withdrawn.