John Thune

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 168, H.R. 5371.

Mr. THUNE. I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider the en bloc nominations listed in S. Res. 412.

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume legislation session.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, we are into the second day of a government shutdown after Democrats, once again, rejected a clean, nonpartisan funding bill to keep the government open while we continue bipartisan appropriations work. We are not going to be voting today, as we have Jewish colleagues who are currently observing Yom Kippur, but we will be voting tomorrow. And we are going to give my Democratic colleagues another opportunity to reopen the government by passing the clean, nonpartisan funding extension before us. I realize that my Democrat colleagues are facing pressure from Members of their far-left base, but they are playing a losing game here. A robust majority of American voters are against a government shutdown. Even some Democrat Members are raising concerns, with a Democrat House Member noting yesterday: This government shutdown is the result of hardball politics driven by the demands far-left groups are making for Democratic Party leaders to put on a show of their opposition to President Trump. The shutdown is hurting Americans and our economy . . . normal policy disagreements are no reason to subject our constituents to the continued harm of this shutdown. That, from a Democrat House Member. Organizations ranging from the National Fraternal Order of Police to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to the Teamsters have spoken out against shutting down the government. The Teamsters president said Tuesday: A shutdown will hurt working people. Period. Senators should . . . pass the House-passed clean, short-term funding bill. Senators should . . . pass the House-passed clean, short- term funding bill. That, again, from the president of the Teamsters. ``Clean'' is what he said. My Democrat colleagues have little to work with in this debate, with their own previous statements working against them, and so they have tried to portray the clean, nonpartisan funding bill before us as something other than what it is. But the Teamsters president reminds us of the facts. We are not asking Democrats to swallow a list of new Republican policies or partisan demands--not in there. We are asking Democrats to do nothing more than pass a clean, nonpartisan bill to fund the government for a few more weeks so that we can get back to bipartisan appropriations work. And I said ``bipartisan appropriations work''--the kind of bipartisan work that has seen the Senate pass three appropriations bills so far by robust bipartisan margins, the kind of work that we want to continue once Democrats have stopped holding government funding hostage to a long list of partisan demands. So far, three of our Democrat colleagues have joined Republicans to attempt to reopen the government. If we can just find a few more Democrats to join us, we can end this shutdown and get back to bipartisan appropriations work and the business of the American people. Democrats voted for clean CRs like the one before us 13 times--13 times--during the Biden administration. I hope they will join us to pass this clean CR and reopen the government for hard-working Americans. I yield the floor.

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 11:30 a.m. on Friday, October 3; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and notwithstanding rule XXII, the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of S. Res. 412, postcloture, and that all postcloture time be expired at 1:30 p.m.

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, for the information of my colleagues, Senators should expect a series of votes at 1:30 p.m.

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, here we are. Democrats have bowed to the far-left, and they have shut down the Federal Government. As of this morning, critical Federal employees, including members of the military, Border Patrol agents, and air traffic controllers, are working without pay, and a number of government services are unavailable or at risk. Democrats are well aware of the damage of a government shutdown. We have heard it from them time and time again. But apparently none of that matters to Democrats today. All that seems to matter is that their far-left base sees them ``fighting'' against President Trump, and the American people just have to suffer the consequences. We can end this today. There is a clean, nonpartisan continuing resolution at the desk that has no partisan policy riders, no new Republican policies. It just keeps the government running until November 21. The House passed it. The President is ready to sign it into law. The only thing standing in the way is Senate Democrats, who are demanding $1.5 trillion in partisan spending to keep the government open for 7 weeks. That is right. They are demanding more than the defense budget in their resolution to keep the government open for 4 weeks. That is not how this works. We were in the situation 13 times when Democrats had the majority under President Biden, and 13 times, Republicans provided more than enough votes to keep the government open, and that is what needs to happen here. We are one--just one--Senate rollcall vote away from ending this shutdown. We need a handful of Democrats to join Republicans to reopen the government. Once we do that, then we can talk about the issues that Democrats are raising. We are not going to engage in bipartisan discussions while Democrats are holding the Federal Government hostage to their partisan demands. This Democrat shutdown is actually delaying progress on the issues that Democrats claim to be interested in. It is also delaying important work on appropriations bills. Now, I have said throughout this year that my goal is to do appropriations through regular order--regular order--which allows Members of both parties to give voice to their priorities and to help shape appropriations bills. We have made good progress already this year. Thanks to the work of Chair Collins and the Appropriations Committee, we passed three bipartisan bills before the August recess for the first time since 2018, and there are a number of additional bills ready for floor consideration. But that work is now delayed because we have to deal with the Democrats' shutdown mess. How long this shutdown lasts depends entirely on Democrats. Republicans are united around a clean, nonpartisan funding extension. A few Democrats joined us last night and voted to keep the government open. They will have another opportunity to vote today, and I hope more of our Democrat colleagues will agree to end this shutdown. Real people are suffering right now because of Democrats' temper tantrum, and it needs to stop. Mr. President, I want to close with this: In 2019, in the midst of another shutdown, the Democrat leader urged reopening the government before negotiating on the one point of disagreement. He said then: Why must we hold millions of Americans who depend on the services of these Agencies that are closed--hundreds of thousands of workers who get paid by these Agencies--why must we hold them hostage? Why must a temper tantrum determine how we vote and what happens in this government? Everyone can shut down the government on anything--any leader, any President. It is not the way to do things. I hope that the Democrat leader will heed his own words. Democrats need to reopen the government, and we need to get back to work for the American people. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order for the two leaders to enter motions to reconsider without being on the prevailing side with respect to the cloture votes on the motions to proceed to S. 2882 and H.R. 5371; further, that the mandatory quorum call with respect to the Cao nomination in S. Res. 412 be waived.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I enter a motion to reconsider.

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that if any nominations are confirmed during today's session of the Senate, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 12 noon on Thursday, October 2; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of S. Res. 412, postcloture; finally, that all time during adjournment and leader remarks count postcloture on the resolution.

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, we are just 14 hours away from a government shutdown. The House has passed a clean, nonpartisan continuing resolution to fund the government until November 21. The President is ready to sign it, but Senate Democrats are standing in the way. In a vacuum, this CR would get almost every Democratic vote. It just would. This is a clean CR that has no partisan riders, extends a bunch of programs that are Democratic priorities. . . . it's clean. Those last few lines aren't mine, and they are not a quote from some other Republican. They are a quote from a mainstream journalist who is acknowledging what everyone knows, and that is that Republicans have offered up a clean, nonpartisan funding extension, the same kind of extension Democrats have repeatedly supported in the past, and Democrats are blocking it for their own partisan purposes. It is right here. This is what it is. This is a partisan CR--24 pages to keep the government open until November 21, at which time the Democrats will have almost the same leverage they have right now? I mean, hopefully, by then, we will have passed more appropriations bills. I would like it if we passed all of them, but it is reasonable to expect we won't have them all through conference and in place on the President's desk. So they will have another funding cliff they can take advantage of come November 21. This is ready to pass right now. This keeps the government open. This funds the government and protects Federal workers and the American people from the hostage-taking that has become, evidently, now the Democrat norm, even though it is something they decried not that many years ago. It is right here in front of us--right here. We can pass this today. We can pass it right now. All we have to do is get support from the Democrats. The House has passed it. This is a House-passed bill. We take it up, and the Senate passes it. We send it to the President, the President signs it into law, and the government stays funded. Pretty straightforward, right? And it was something that was done many, many times in the past, as I mentioned, by Democrats when they had the majority. Now, this right here is a chart. I mentioned 13 times. So when the Democrats were in the majority around here, on 13 different occasions we passed short-term continuing resolutions, funding resolutions to keep the government funded. And, as you can see, there were a lot of, interestingly enough, Republican votes--Republicans who voted to keep the government open when the Democrats had the majority--on 13 separate occasions. You can look at the numbers there. The lowest number on any one of those is 65 votes. All we need today in the Senate, in order for us to keep the government open, is to get eight Democrats to vote with Republicans. That is all it takes. That is all it takes, eight of them. It doesn't have to be all of them. I mean, I understand the reason, in many cases, the Democrats don't want to go down this path now. It has nothing to do with the substance of this. I mean, again, look at this. They want to argue about the substance of a continuing resolution that funds the government for 7 weeks, at which time they will have similar leverage? It doesn't have anything to do with that. It has everything to do with politics because, when this happened, there was a Democrat President in the White House. Now there is Republican President, President Trump. That is what this is about. It is about partisan politics. Now, there is another chart, which I will show you here, which I think points out, too, the hypocrisy of the Democrats. This is the percentage of Democrat Senators who supported Biden-era CRs. Look at that: 100 percent--100 percent. There were two of them at 98 percent. So they must have lost one or two on the other side on a couple different occasions. But 13 times, when they had the majority, almost all of them, without exception, voted to fund the government because that is kind of simply what we do. We try to avoid government shutdowns because they tend to be disruptive. Everybody knows that. In fact, I could go through a long list of quotes, and I will just give you a few to give you a frame of reference. In 2023, the Democratic leader called a shutdown ``avoidable, irresponsible and deeply damaging'' and noted that a shutdown would cause ``disruptions for millions of New Yorkers to services they rely on, while thousands of Federal workers would be furloughed.'' In 2019, during the midst of a government shutdown, the senior Democrat Senator from Hawaii stated: While rich people are protected, this shutdown leaves the people who are most vulnerable to fend for themselves. In 2023, the senior Democrat from Massachusetts, who has been one of the biggest voices in support of a shutdown this time around, had this to say: Okay, so let's start with how much pain a government shutdown is going to cause us right here in Massachusetts. . . . [W]e have about 25,000 federal workers in Massachusetts. These are public servants just trying to do their jobs, trying to help people. They have mortgages, they have childcare bills, they've got to put gas in the tank and food on the table, and they're not going to get their paychecks. Well, that is a sampling. This is an endless video loop of Members on this side who have been saying these things now for years, not decades. So I could go on. In fact, let me just give you a couple more for some additional perspective. We have got Democrats, as recently as this year, talking about the negative effects a shutdown has on American families. And now Democrats are so committed to shutting down the government, they are rejecting a clean--clean, clean--nonpartisan, short-term funding extension, the very same kind of extension that, as I mentioned, they supported 13 times during the Biden administration. So what has changed? I think we all know. It is not that the problems with a shutdown have changed. All those quotes that they said, I assume, maybe, they still believe them. This is the Democrats far-left base and far-left Senators that have demanded a showdown with the President, and the Democrat leaders have bowed to their demands. And apparently--apparently--the American people just have to suffer the consequences. When I took office as majority leader, I made clear my commitment to regular order, in particular to a bipartisan appropriations process, and I have delivered on that. We have passed three of the fiscal year 2026 appropriations bills with strong bipartisan margins here in the Senate, and I am eager to get back to bipartisan appropriations work. That is why Republicans have put forward a clean, nonpartisan short- term funding resolution to keep the government open to enable us to finish that appropriations work. We wanted a completely noncontroversial bill so that no one would be inclined to vote against it and so that we could get back to funding the government the way it should be funded, not through endless CRs but through thoughtful, considered, yearlong appropriations bills. But the Democrats just can't take yes for an answer. They are rejecting a bipartisan process and attempting to take government funding hostage. And I had hoped that yesterday's White House meeting might mean the Democrats are starting to rethink their plan to shut down the government, but it seems that their leadership, at least, is full speed ahead. Republicans--House, Senate, and White House--are united in our commitment to fund the government through a clean, nonpartisan funding resolution and then to get back to the business of bipartisan appropriations. So Democrats have a choice to make. They can shut down the government and subject the American people to all the problems that come with a shutdown--many of which, as I have said, they have enumerated in the countless quotes they have made in the past--or they can join Republicans to pass a clean, nonpartisan, short-term funding bill and keep the government's lights on. For the sake of the American people, Mr. President, I really hope they choose the latter. I yield the floor. Recognition of the Minority Leader

Mr. THUNE. The appropriators--

Mr. THUNE. The date. They put the date in there.

Mr. THUNE. So the Senator from New York--the way that we have done it was a different business model than the one he used. We actually had the Appropriations Committee sit down, and the date that they come up with, November 21, was agreed upon by the House and Senate appropriators, Republican and Democrat.

Mr. THUNE. I will. I will. And the Ukraine issue you are talking about wasn't a CR. That was an entirely different issue. So don't throw that into this mix.

Mr. THUNE. But what we are talking about--the Democrat leader and his colleagues have the same leverage on November 21. This is a short-term CR. This is what we do all the time around here, as witnessed by the chart you were just using. It is 24 pages long, funds the government until November 21, at which time you have the same leverage then that you have right now. And we have until the end of the year to fix the ACA credit issue, and we are happy--as I said yesterday and I said on multiple occasions--to sit down with you to do that.