David Perdue

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I rise today to express my sympathy and support for the people in my home State of Georgia. This past weekend, severe storms and deadly tornadoes tore through South Georgia destroying homes and businesses and taking the lives, unfortunately, of at least 15 Georgians. Among those areas hit the hardest were counties surrounding the cities of Adel and Albany. These counties and cities are very near where I grew up and where I now reside personally. When last weekend's storms hit, emergency management teams there were still leading recovery efforts in response to deadly storms that had just caused widespread destruction earlier this month. I am very grateful for the tireless and ongoing efforts of our first responders in our State and stand with our Georgia families during this difficult time. Our hearts, of course, go out to the families affected by these severe storms. I now yield for the senior Senator from Georgia.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President. I now ask unanimous consent that the Senate observe a moment of silence for those who have lost their lives in Georgia and across the southeast in these recent storms.

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

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I rise to discuss the vacancy of the U.S. Supreme Court. We have been on this issue and what needs to happen next year when our next President is sworn in. For months this year, I and other Members of this body held our ground in saying that the American people deserve a voice in this process. We talked about how the integrity of the advice and consent process, clearly outlined in article II, section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, was at stake. We outlined years of precedent against nominating and confirming a Supreme Court Justice during a Presidential election cycle. The last time a vacancy arose and a nominee was confirmed in a Presidential election year was 1932, and 1888 was the last Presidential election year in which a Justice was nominated and confirmed by a divided government. Confirming a nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court should never be distorted by political theater of a Presidential election cycle. This is a bipartisan position. Both parties have said at different times in the past decade or so what I and many colleagues on this floor have said just this year. Since day one, I have consistently said that no Supreme Court nominee should be considered for the Supreme Court or considered by the Senate before the next President is sworn in. That also meant no consideration during the lameduck, either, no matter the outcome of the election. You can't have it both ways. This was my position before the election. This is still my position today. It was and is about the principle, not the individual. As an outsider to the political process, this was a logical and an easy position to take from the very beginning. The process for nominating and confirming a Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court is enshrined in our Constitution. The hyperpartisanship and politics of a Presidential election cycle should have absolutely no place in this process. Confirming any individual to a lifetime appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court must rise from that kind of political posturing. It must be above any political theater. Furthermore, as I said previously, the American people deserved a voice in this process. Election day was not only about changing the direction of our country, but it was also a referendum on the ballots of the Supreme Court for generations to come. Our decision to withhold consent on any Supreme Court nominee, until after a new President is sworn in, protected the integrity of the advice-and-consent process from political games in a heated Presidential campaign cycle. That decision was entirely within the rights and responsibilities of the Senate, as outlined in the Constitution. We did our job, and next year we are going to continue to do that job of advice and consent as we consider the next nomination for the Supreme Court. With a new President sworn in, it will be time for the Senate to confirm a nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. The election is over. The people have spoken. Americans have elected a new President. They chose a new direction. I urge Members of this body to listen to them, and I urge this body to remember the integrity of the process. I also look forward to learning from whomever President-Elect Trump nominates to serve on the Supreme Court and having the opportunity to vote on his or her confirmation. I yield my time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. PERDUE

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

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I rise today and ask unanimous consent to engage in a colloquy with my Republican colleagues up through the next hour.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I believe what we are going to talk about over the next hour is one of the most important issues facing our government. We sat here today and listened to a lot of very valid pleas for help from the Federal Government. The reality is, we don't have the money. There are four words I have not heard in the U.S. Senate or Congress, actually, since I have been here over the last year and a half, and those words are ``We cannot afford it.'' The problem is that right now we have a budget crisis. We have a debt crisis. Let me say this: Fixing the budget process will not solve the debt crisis. Let's be very clear about that. But we will not solve the debt crisis unless and until we address the dysfunction in our budget process. The problem is that in the last 42 years, since the Budget Act of 1974, the budget process has only worked four times. This chart explains this fact. We can see the yellow lines show that--and I hope my colleagues can focus on this--only four times in the last 42 years has this budget process that was enacted in 1974 actually functioned at all to fund the Federal Government. One of the major responsibilities of our jobs here in the Senate and the House is to fund the Federal Government, to take care of discretionary needs such as those heard today from Flint, MI, Louisiana, West Virginia, and Maryland. These are valid needs, but every dime we spend in our discretionary spending is borrowed. I will talk more about that a little later. We have some speakers today who are going to talk about the results of not having a budget process that works. This chart explains that over the last 42 years, since 1974, there were four times that the 13 appropriations bills actually got passed and we funded the government the way we are supposed to. The blue lines are the actual appropriations bills. Since 1998-- somewhere in there--we went from 13 bills to 12 bills that actually fund. These are appropriations bills that fund the Federal Government. They fund $1.1 trillion of a $3.9 trillion spend of the Federal Government. This chart shows that over the life of this law--these are the laws, the appropriation bills that have been passed each year, and the average is the red line. The average over this period of time is 2.6 bills of the 12 or 13 bills that have to be passed to fund the government. Over the last 19 consecutive years, we have used 107 continuing resolutions to get past the fiscal year to make sure we fund the government on the first day of the new fiscal year. This is how serious this is. Next Monday is the first day of the next fiscal year, fiscal year 2017. We sitting here today are voting on the CR to get us past this day so the government doesn't have to shut down next week--those dreaded words of ``irresponsibility'' and ``intransigence.'' Quite frankly, this is part of the problem because what happens is what happened last year. The dysfunction in the system is centered around this: The budget is not a law, it is a resolution. That means that a majority, with 51 percent of the votes in this body, can pass a political statement. That is exactly what happened last year. Let me say this before we go any further: Everything you hear today is nonpartisan. This should be about a nonpartisan exercise that we have in funding the government. Yes, we are going to have debates based on our partisanship and based on what our beliefs and principles are, but the basic process should be a politically neutral platform that allows us to argue our differences in the budget process, get to a budget, move to the appropriations, and fund the government by the end of the fiscal year, and we have only done that four times in the last 42 years. The dysfunction is centered around this. If you look at this chart, every year we just don't have enough time, basically. And it is not just time, it is the process. The budget is based on a resolution, and 51 percent can vote for it. Last year, as an example, the majority--the Republican majority, by the way--voted a political bill that took $7.5 trillion out of the President's budget over the next 10 years without one Democratic vote. Then we got to the authorization process--and the authorization process, by the way, is a law and they have to have 60 votes. So guess what. The people on the other side of the aisle, my friends, said: Well, you didn't ask our opinion in the budget process, why do you want our help now? So they don't let us get on the appropriations. We have some $310 billion that we are funding today that is not authorized, over 256 agencies and programs. The next thing is we go to appropriation. Again, the minority party can stop the process by not letting us get on the bills. We have a situation right now--this is nonpartisan, but it is a reality. The Defense appropriations bill which funds our military was passed unanimously in committee, the way it was supposed to operate. Democrats and Republicans got together, worked it out, made amendments, and came up with a bill that funded our Federal Government's military. Yet we tried six times to get it to the floor. There are political reasons why it hasn't gotten to the floor, but it shows the dysfunction we have in this process. Mr. President, the time has come for us to address this process. I am so excited to have various Members of the freshman class here. We have the chairman of the Budget Committee coming down. We have some other senior Members who have been working on this for years. I notice my good friend from the State of North Carolina, Senator Thom Tillis, is here, and I will ask him to give us his perspective. There is a big military effort in their State, and Senator Tillis has been a soldier in this, not only in the Senate but in his time as speaker of the house in North Carolina.

Mr. PERDUE. I say to Senator Tillis, thank you for coming to the floor and talking about this issue. With your experience in State government in North Carolina, you know that 44 States have a balanced budget law. Guess what States don't have a financial situation, a financial problem. I thank the Senator for speaking. I note that my colleague from Oklahoma, Senator Lankford, is on the floor. He has been a warrior on this budget before when he was in the House and now in the Senate for the last 2 years. I welcome his comments to speak about this as well. Senator Lankford.

Mr. PERDUE. I say thank you to Senator Lankford. I think my colleagues can see the passion and history he has had here and a lot of great thoughts. I note that the chairman of our Budget Committee in the Senate, Senator Mike Enzi from Wyoming, is here on the floor. I am going to turn it over to him and ask him to give us his comments. He has been fighting this for years. As chairman of the Budget Committee last year, he managed to get a budget out of our committee that actually took over $7 trillion out of the President's budget at that point in time. I say to Senator Enzi, thank you so much for joining us.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I thank the chairman for his comments, but more importantly I thank him for his heart in terms of running the Budget Committee and leading us into this observation and recognition. As this chart says, we have a dysfunctional system, and we don't have an alternative but to find a better plan. With that, I note my good friend and esteemed colleague from Tennessee Senator Corker is here. He is chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, but more importantly he lets me sit next to him on the Budget Committee. I want to say this about the Foreign Relations Committee. It is a very bipartisan committee. Under Bill Clinton, just 16 years ago, we spent about $20 billion on the State Department and USAID. Currently, we are spending about $54 billion. That is just one department. Those are constant dollars to show you how government has sort of exploded in the past 16 years--both under Republican leadership and under Democratic leadership. I am so glad Senator Corker is here, and I look forward to his comments.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I thank Senator Corker very much. Moral depravity is so prevalent here, and it is no more present and no more important than in the area of funding our military. I notice Senator Ernst from Iowa is here, and I appreciate her leadership as a fellow freshman in the Senate, but let me highlight one thing very quickly. Senator Corker just mentioned that about one-third, 30 percent of what we spend--35 percent over the last 8 years--is borrowed, and it is projected that over the next 10 years about 35 percent will be borrowed. About 30 percent of what we spend is discretionary. That means every discretionary dollar we spend as a Federal Government is borrowed. Let me say that again. Every dollar we spend in our discretionary budget is borrowed. That means our military, our Veterans' Administration, our military construction, our domestic programs, all the things we are talking about are borrowed. That means we have to get serious. We have disinvested in our military because of this budget crisis, and it is just another reason to get at this budget process. I can't tell Senator Ernst how much I appreciate her being here, and I look forward to her comments.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I thank Senator Ernst. I enjoy her leadership in the Senate. With that, I notice Senator Rounds of South Dakota is here. He was a Governor who dealt with this budget issue in an executive and legislative body in South Dakota, and I am looking forward to his comments. I thank him for being here.

Mr. PERDUE. I thank Senator Rounds for his comments. I appreciate his leadership as an ex-Governor in this body. I note that Senator Sullivan from Alaska is here, and he has been very outspoken about this since he got here last year--another freshman Member. I look forward to Senator Sullivan's comments.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, Senator Sullivan is a warrior. I am glad to be here with him. It gives me hope that we are going to persevere and get this done. Now to help us close this out, we have our good friend from Montana, Senator Daines, who has real world experience--both as a consultant but also starting and running a high-tech company. He understands what profit is about, but, more importantly, he understands what meeting needs is about. I am so glad that he can help us close this out. I have a few remaining comments when he finishes, but I thank Senator Daines for being here.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I say thank you to Senator Daines. His leadership means the world here. With that, I have hope we are going to get there. In light of the time and the hour and the other business that is before this Senate body tonight, I will abridge my closing comments. I want to say this. There is a four-letter word missing in Washington today--H-O-P-E. People sent this class, 12 members of the Republican caucus--that is almost 25 percent of our caucus--are freshmen this year. We ran on this topic, as you heard several Members say, but we had the chairman of the Budget Committee here. We had the chairman of Foreign Relations here. These people are very concerned about this topic. We are not just complaining about the status quo. Again, we are not complaining about the other side. There are no innocent parties when it comes to this debt crisis. If you look at the last 75, 80 years, this country has lived and benefited from the greatest economic boom in the history of mankind. Yet here we are today, $20 trillion of debt, over $100 trillion of future commitments already made by this Federal Government. It is basically $1 million for every family in America. We don't need to talk about the need anymore. What we need to talk about is what do we do. That is what we came up here for. We need to focus on results. This is what we are proposing. We put it in language now. We are moving to put it into a bill on the floor. We have Democratic input. Again, let me say this. The goal is not to solve the debt crisis. That is the need. The goal in this process is to create a politically neutral platform where both sides--whether they are in the majority or the minority--can make their points during a budget process, move to an appropriations process, and get the government funded every year without all this drama. That is what the people of America want. It will protect our military. It will protect our national security. It will let us take care of the domestic needs we need, and it will let us invest in our infrastructure to get this economy going again. Without this exercise, we will not start down the path that may take 30 or 40 years to bring this debt under control. It is that large. Let me emphasize one more thing. If this debt is not addressed soon, the rising interest rates that we all know are coming--we are living in a false world today of zero interest rates. If we just get back to our 30-year average of about 5 percent, we will be paying $1 trillion in interest. That is not possible. It simply is not workable. All things come into the conversation. This is what is going to happen. We are going to start debating this on the floor, hopefully soon. It may run into next year. It may go to the following year. My commitment to my people at home is, we are not going to give up on this fight until we get something done about this. We proposed a couple of things. Three guiding principles were developed by a small group of people, and it has been welcomed by a growing number of people in this body. No. 1, the budget needs to be a law. No. 2, everything we spend--all $4 trillion of it--needs to go into the budget. They need to be debated and covered in the budget by both sides. No. 3, if we don't fund the government by the end of the fiscal year, there has to be serious consequences. You heard one proposal tonight by Senator Lankford. There may be others, but we are going to put on the Senate and the House, for that matter, real consequences if we don't get the Federal Government budget done. Again, this is an exercise that we hope will be bipartisan. We want no advantage in this. We want a process that doesn't advantage either party. It gives both equal standing in the budget process, leading to a reasonable and effective funding of the Federal Government. A politically neutral platform, that is our goal. I will close with this. If not now, when? If not us, who? I thank the forbearance of the Presiding Officer tonight. Thank you for allowing us to do this. I yield back my time. I see we have other speakers on the floor.

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. I say to Senator Daines, I am honored to be here with the other freshmen. I am humbled by the emotion that I have heard here in the last half hour. I am humbled to be a part of this freshman class. By the way, we all ran on this issue. We ran on the fact that government was not functioning, that it was dysfunctional. What we see today and why we are here on the floor of the Senate today is to talk about that dysfunction. Let me just share a few highlights of what I have seen in the press in the last few weeks: ``Obama administration again underestimates Islamic State as Afghan affiliate grows into threat.'' ``DC transit police officer charged with aiding ISIS.'' ``ISIS increasingly using women and children to terrorize France.'' ``Five US troops wounded in combat with ISIS in Afghanistan.'' ``Vladimir Putin's rumblings raise new fears of Ukraine conflict.'' ``Russia holds biggest military drill yet in Crimea.'' ``Iran escalates high seas harassment of US Navy.'' ``Iran threatens to destroy Israel with 100,000 missiles.'' ``North Korea conducts fifth nuclear test, claims it has made warheads with `higher strike power.' '' ``South Korea prepares for `worst case scenario' with North Korea.'' These are just a few samples of headlines in the last few weeks alone. What we see right now going on in the Senate is gridlock--the gridlock that is creating the backlash that we are seeing in the Presidential race right now. People back home know Washington is dysfunctional and that it is not working. But right now we have a situation where the Democrats are blocking these Defense appropriations. Yet again, the Senate has reentered this period of dysfunction. The world is more dangerous than it has been at any time in my lifetime. I am a product of the nuclear age, the Cold War. I grew up in a military town, and at one point we had B-52s there. I remember the Cuban missile crisis, where KC-135s, B-52s, and C-141s were flying out of there in support of the blockade over Cuba. Yet, today I believe the world is more dangerous than it has ever been. Right now we face a global security crisis. I believe it is on several levels. First, there is the rise of aggressiveness in Russia and China, partly caused by our own intransigence, by creating power vacuums around the world and encouraging misbehavior. Second, right now I believe ISIS is a product of our own creation in many ways. The early removal of our troops from Iraq created a vacuum into which ISIS has grown. They needed territory to validate their caliphate, and they got that. We now face nuclear proliferation in Iran and North Korea. We have a cyber war going on today. I personally believe we have been invaded, which means that today we are at war with nation states around the world. Right now, two brigades are being stood up in my home State, in Augusta, GA, Fort Gordon. Two cyber warrior brigades are being stood up right now--2 of 31 brigades in our U.S. Army. I am proud of those people. They are going to stand up to this threat, but it is real. Lastly, we have an arms race in space that nobody is talking about. In my lifetime, I have never seen the symmetric threats and the asymmetric threats that we face in our country today. Ensuring the safety of our men and women in uniform--those who protect our freedom around the world--should never be open to political games, least of all now in the face of all these myriad threats, but obviously Senate Democrats in this body don't feel that way. Since I came to the Senate, our colleagues across the aisle--many friends--have blocked funding for our military six times. Six times in my tenure here, Democratic Members of this body have put their partisan games before funding in support of our troops, and that is after the appropriations--as you just heard, 30 to 0--14 Democrats and 16 Republicans got together in a room, argued their differences, and came to a bipartisan agreement. Isn't that what we were sent here to do? That is what they did. They passed this bill in committee. There is no debate here; everybody in this body wants this bill. I just don't understand why they are now holding it hostage for other partisan political games they are playing right now. One of only 6 reasons 13 Colonies came together in the first place was to provide for the national defense. Yet, some 200 years later, in the midst of a global security crisis, Congress can't even get that done. We can't fund our government and fund our military without drama. What message does this send to our men and women in uniform around the world? Can you imagine? They can't even depend on us here in this body to fund the needs they have every day. This is a total breakdown in the system. Democrats are endangering our men and women in uniform, and they are not doing their job. I am outraged by this. Georgians back home are outraged. People around the country are outraged by this. Is anyone surprised that less than 20 percent of Americans trust the Federal Government? I am not surprised at all. As I have said before, Democrats claim they want to support our military. They tell us all their heart-wrenching stories. Some of them have children in uniform. They call for action, and yet they are the ones blocking this bill and blocking us from debating this on the floor of the Senate. I don't understand that. At a time when we should be united in the face of global threats, the brinksmanship and gridlock permeating in this body are quite simply disgraceful. America must lead again. It must lead in the world. I have traveled the world a lot, as the Presiding Officer has, in the last year and a half, and the No. 1 request I get from heads of state we talk with is America needs to lead again. They are not asking for us to be the police anymore; they just need us to lead to common solutions against these same threats that threaten their countries just as they threaten ours. We have to lead again, but to do that, we have to have a strong foreign policy. To have a strong foreign policy, we have to have a strong defense. To have a strong defense, we have to have a strong economy. We know about the debt crisis. We can't fix our military without having a strong economy and solving this debt crisis. One of the biggest complaints I hear when we are doing continuing resolutions--and that is what we do when we don't do our job, by the way--is that it really hurts the military's ability to plan and to train. They can't look forward, they are so worried about getting funding today. And I have seen those shortfalls around the world, as the Presiding Officer has. That is what it has come to. My colleagues across the aisle believe their political gain in this Presidential election season is more important than our men and women in uniform and more important than protecting our country. This is not a partisan comment, this is fact. I am an outsider of this process, and I have to tell you that I feel the same outrage the people back home feel. We can no longer take our security for granted, we can no longer take our military for granted, and we can no longer take our men and women in uniform for granted. I firmly believe our Founders would be outraged by what is going on right now. Senator William Pew was the very first person in 1789 who stood in my seat right here. In the Senate room just down the hall, William Pew--ironic as it is, a direct descendent of his was on my staff when I ran for this office. But I think that man would be absolutely apoplectic about us not funding our military. Can you imagine somebody who put their life on the line back then looking at what we are doing right now, the nonsense we have going on? The stakes are too high for this nonsense to continue. Democrats must drop this obstructionism. It is time for Washington to fund our military, pass the Defense appropriations bill, and move on to fund our government. Senator Daines, I can't thank you enough for arranging this colloquy today and for what we did yesterday. I know Senator Sullivan is on the floor to speak. His leadership in this regard has been very encouraging to me as well. Thank you. I yield the floor.

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I rise tonight after having listened to several floor speeches today. I don't understand it. Here we are again with problems such as the debt, the Zika virus, funding our military, and yet we spent the majority of the day in this body talking about something I think we have already decided is not going to change this year, and that is the potential nomination to the vacancy on the Supreme Court. I just think I need to do this one more time. I have spoken before about my position, and I want to rise in support of Senator Grassley, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. I think it is important that I again discuss why I believe the Senate should not hold hearings or schedule a vote on any Supreme Court nominee until the American people have chosen whom they want to be their next President. I would first like to address this issue of the Senate's responsibility under the Constitution with respect to judicial matters and judicial nominees in particular. According to article II, section 2, the President has the power to nominate Supreme Court Justices-- nothing new there. We in this body have the power to either consent or withhold our consent from this nominee. The minority leader himself said at that time when referring to the Senate's constitutional responsibility to confirm President George W. Bush's judicial nominee: Nowhere in that document does it say the Senate has a duty to give presidential nominees a vote. He then went on to say: The Senate is not a rubber stamp for the executive branch. There is also no provision in the Constitution requiring the Senate Judiciary Committee to hold hearings for all judicial nominees. In fact, the Constitution and its provisions laying out the process for confirming judicial nominees were ratified 28 years before the Senate Judiciary Committee even came into existence. Therefore, it is clear to me that the Senate's action in withholding consent from this nominee is entirely consistent with our rights and responsibilities as a coequal branch of government under the Constitution. By choosing to withhold our consent in this case, we are doing our job, just as we have said all along and just as our jobs are laid out in the Constitution. I would also like to address the argument that the lack of hearings for a Supreme Court nominee this year is somehow unprecedented. That is just nonsense. In modern times, the opposite is actually true. The last time a Supreme Court vacancy arose and a nominee was confirmed in a Presidential election year was actually in 1932. But the last time this situation occurred where we had a divided government and we had a Supreme Court Justice nominated and confirmed in that year was 1888. Mr. President, a lot of water has gone under the bridge since then, and both sides have taken this position. Furthermore, my colleagues across the aisle have consistently argued over the years that the Senate should not act on a Supreme Court nomination during a Presidential election year. The hypocrisy of this situation is just amazing to me. As an outsider to this process, this is what drives my friends and people back home absolutely mad. It was then-Senator Biden--our current Vice President--who was chairman of the Judiciary Committee at the time, who said that President George H.W. Bush should avoid a Supreme Court nomination until after the 1992 Presidential election. Then-Senator Biden went further than what we are doing today: He then said the President shouldn't even nominate someone. He made the same point my colleagues and I are making today when he said: It is my view that if a Supreme Court justice resigns tomorrow or within the next several weeks, or resigns at the end of the year, President Bush should consider following the practice of a majority of his predecessors and not--and not-- name a nominee until after the November election is completed. I don't know what else to say, Mr. President. Both sides have made this same argument we are making today in the past. Finally, I believe the decision to not hold hearings for a Supreme Court nominee this year is a wise course of action in the midst of a Presidential election. As I have said all along, this is not the time we want to interject into this political process the decision to make a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court--a decision that may tip the balance of this particular Court. Then-Senator Biden also said, when discussing the potential of holding Supreme Court confirmation hearings against the backdrop of election-year politics: A process that is already in doubt in the minds of many will become distrusted by all. Senate consideration of a nominee under these circumstances is not fair to the President, to the nominee, or to the Senate itself. I agree with then-Senator Biden that the confirmation of a lifetime appointee to our Nation's highest Court is far too important to become entangled in the partisan wrangling during a Presidential election year. As a member of the Judiciary Committee, I am, therefore, proud to stand with Chairman Grassley and my colleagues in the committee in saying no Supreme Court nominee should be considered by the Senate before the next President is sworn into office. I also believe that it shouldn't be taken up in a lameduck session. You can't have it both ways, Mr. President.

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I have one other topic I would like to cover, if I may, and that is about the other conversation we hear about from back home, and that is ObamaCare. We just spent several weeks back home in the State working, and I personally spent the last 3 weeks touring our State, from Hahira to Hiawassee, and I can tell you that I get one question out of every group to which I speak, and that is this: What can be done about ObamaCare? My premiums are going up. My insurance was canceled. It said that I could keep my doctor if I wanted to. It said I could keep my insurance company if I wanted to. Yet I lost my doctor and I am losing my insurance. I really believe this is a critical issue we need to talk about. Americans have never settled for failure. Yet right now people are saying that we need to accept ObamaCare, that it is the law. Yet I am saying it is collapsing under its own weight. In four decades of business, I don't think I have ever seen anything as perverse as ObamaCare and the effect it is having not only on our business community but on the people back home. We are still talking ObamaCare today, Mr. President, because it is a complete disaster. It has failed the very people this President and the Democrats in this body claimed to champion--the working men and women of America. It did nothing to go after overall costs and the spiraling nature of health care costs, which continue to explode and are the No. 1 driver of the fact that in the next 10 years, unless we do something, this President has a budget that will add $10 trillion more to our current debt. ObamaCare did nothing at all to deal with the number of doctors in this country. It inserted government between patients and their doctors and created a shortage of doctors. Right now we are averaging around 10,000--we are losing about 10,000 doctors a year under ObamaCare. In fact, projections are that a doctor shortage in just the next 10 years could top 90,000 doctors. That is staggering. ObamaCare raises taxes, increases premiums, and it chokes out our choices. Not only that, but deductibles are up dramatically. My home State of Georgia is feeling the weight of this failure. UnitedHealthcare and Cigna are leaving the ObamaCare exchange at the end of the year. Last month, Aetna announced it was joining them. At the start of this year--this is an astounding number--all 159 counties in Georgia had at least 2 carriers to depend on. Now, after 9 months, 96 of the 159 counties in Georgia have only 1 option. I repeat: 96 of the 159 counties have only 1 option. Georgians are being robbed of health care choices. They are also facing even higher premium and deductible costs. Premiums have risen in Georgia by an average of 33 percent. Every provider left in Georgia is raising premiums by double digits next year. I will highlight a couple of them: Blue Cross Blue Shield, 21 percent; Alliant, 21 percent; Ambetter, 13.7 percent; Kaiser, 18 percent; Harken Health, 51 percent; Humana, 67 percent. In 2009, President Obama railed against fewer choices. While selling ObamaCare, he said: ``In 34 States, 75 percent of the insurance market is controlled by five or fewer companies . . . and without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down.'' Gee, it sounds like he knew what was coming, except he was complaining about that at the time, and today it has gotten worse. That is exactly what is happening in Georgia because of ObamaCare. These are problems that are not limited to just Georgia. Aetna is leaving 10 other States as we speak. Today, 31 percent of all counties nationwide, comprising almost 2\1/2\ million Americans enrolled in ObamaCare exchanges, are more likely than not to have just one choice in provider. That is what the President was complaining about in 2009. Insurance companies across the country are facing hundreds of millions in losses. It means fewer choices and higher costs for patients. The GAO recently reported that the pre-ObamaCare plans available in most States were more affordable and had lower deductibles than the options now available in ObamaCare exchanges. Profound. Nationally, premiums have risen by an average of 26 percent. Deductibles have risen for individuals with an average income of more than 60 percent than when ObamaCare became law. Premiums are up 26 percent. Deductibles are up over 60 percent. There is no way around it. ObamaCare is a Washington takeover of our health care system that isn't working for average Americans. When they were talking about this back in the day, my comment all along was: How do you feel about ObamaCare? I said: Well, if you like the way the VA is being run, you are going to love ObamaCare. Those words are coming true today. It is collapsing under its own weight. It is failing the very people whom the other side claims to champion--the working poor and the working middle class of our country who are bearing the burden of this nonsense. Monopolies are festering and prices have skyrocketed. As I said, ObamaCare is yet another example of liberal policies failing the very people they claim to champion. The diagnosis is in. None of these problems are going away. That is our problem. In fact, they are getting worse. ObamaCare cannot be allowed to stand. This is not a question of tweaking it around the edges. It is profoundly built incorrectly. We have to repeal the individual and poor mandates and pass an alternative that goes after real drivers of spiraling health care costs. Instead, we should offer transportability, insurability, and accessibility--all the things that were missing prior to ObamaCare but have been proposed fixes that have been in for over 10 years on the Republican side. Accessibility is one of the main things to those who want to purchase coverage without mandating it. This would ensure that no one is priced out of the market, including those with preexisting conditions. We should offer more access to health savings accounts to help drive down costs and allow for the purchase of insurance across State lines to increase competition. Finally, we have to address the frivolous lawsuits that have forced some doctors to practice defensive medicine out of fear of being sued. All these steps are within our grasp. So don't believe those who say there isn't an ObamaCare alternative out there. My friend and Georgia representative, Tom Price, has championed H. 2300, the Empowering Patients First Act, for years. It contains all the solutions I just mentioned and more. I am proud to cosponsor that with John McCain in the Senate. Our health care system is too important for too many Americans and too many to settle for this failure. I wasn't sent to the U.S. Senate to settle for the status quo. I want to say one thing in closing. In the last 8 years, we have been told over and over again that the status quo is the new norm. This is one where the American people are telling me and telling you that they are not accepting this new norm. Mr. President, I yield my time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. PERDUE

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

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I now ask for a second reading, and I object to my own request, all en bloc.

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I understand there are two bills at the desk, and I ask for their first reading en bloc.

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 9:30 a.m., Thursday, September 8; that following the prayer and pledge, the Senate observe a moment of silence in remembrance of the lives lost in the attacks of September 11, 2001; further, that the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, and the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day; finally, that following leader remarks, the Senate resume consideration of S. 2848.

Mr. PERDUE

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

Mr. PERDUE

Mr. PERDUE. Mr. President, I appreciate the accommodation. I would like to add to what has been said here in the last few minutes. We are at a very critical juncture during this Congress and, indeed, in our country. What I want to talk about today is the nonsense that is going on right now on funding our military. These are men and women in uniform around the world whose mission it is to protect our freedom. Let me remind everybody that there were only six reasons why the Thirteen Colonies got together in the first place to create this Union. One of those was to provide for the national defense. Yet here we are basically trying to do what the President has asked--fund the military--and we are being obstructed by the people across the aisle. I just don't understand that. Right now, we have people who are in danger of not being able to fulfill their missions around the world. A member of the Foreign Relations Committee, I have traveled extensively over the last 1\1/2\ years. Around the world, I have seen where dedicated men and women don't have the resources to fulfill their missions, and it endangers the very freedom we have here at home. I believe this is a critical point in this Congress to tell the American people that we are either going to break through this gridlock and move to do what is right or we are going to sit here on our hands and argue the political side of this while our men and women are in danger. One of the hardest things to understand right now is the fact that in the last 30 years, we literally have continued to disinvest in our military. This chart shows how we have disinvested in the military under the last three Democratic Presidents. This green line is a chart of the percentage of GDP we spend on our military. It has gotten down all the way to where today we are spending 3 percent of our GDP. It is the lowest point in the last 30 years. I will say this: The 30-year average here is about 4.2 percent. That differential is 100 basis points. What that means is, in the size of the economy today, it is about $200 billion. Put that in perspective. We are spending about $600 billion on our military today. Can you imagine what a difference that would make? The last time a Secretary of Defense put a budget up based on a bottom-up estimate of need based on the missions around the world--it was Secretary Gates in 2011. In 2011, he estimated that for 2016 and 2017--what we are talking about here in their budget--his estimate was some tens of billions of dollars more than what we are doing now. His estimate was prior to ISIS and prior to Russia's activity in Crimea, Ukraine, and Georgia. What happens now is that in the next 10 years, unless something is done--under the current Presidential plan of spending for the next 10 years, not only are we going to add $9.5 trillion to our debt, but we are going to reduce military spending to 2.6 percent of GDP. That is another roughly $100 billion of cuts if the economy stays the same. I just don't understand this brinksmanship that we see. This is not the first time; I think this is the fifth time we are going to have voted on funding our military. The reaction of the other side befuddles me from the standpoint that they tell us they want to support our men and women. They give us these heart-wrenching stories, and yet they won't stand up and even let us get the bill on the floor. To be brief, it is time for the Democrats to stop the obstructionism and the political showmanship. This is about the security of our country, about the lives of our men and women abroad. They deserve better than this. We can do better than this. The world is more dangerous than at any time in my lifetime. It is time that we stand up and tell the world what we are committed to, and that is to provide for our own national defense. That means funding this Defense appropriations bill. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.