00:00On this vote, the yeas are 56, the nays are 44, three-fifths of the senators duly chosen
00:13and sworn not having voted in the affirmative of the motion is not agreed to.
00:17And that's all it says, a billion dollars to be spent, period.
00:21Now, I have been told that the Secretary of Energy and the Secretary of the Interior are
00:27going to decide, in their unfettered discretion, who's going to get this money in the private
00:31sector.
00:32And they are both two good men.
00:35I know that both of those secretaries, I voted for them, they are total ballers.
00:40I love them to death.
00:43But, when I'm in Washington, I live by this adage, trust in God, but tie up your camel.
00:52Trust in God, but tie up your camel.
00:55Now, this bill will say they can spend, they can give these gifts and grants to whomever
01:01they want, but Congress has to approve them.
01:05Now, about, I don't know, an hour ago, I got a call from one of my supporters, Mr. President.
01:11And you know what he said to me?
01:14He said, Kennedy, for your own good, you need to pull down this amendment.
01:19You have to pull down this amendment.
01:21Kennedy, for your own good, you have to pull down this amendment.
01:24And you know what I told him, Mr. President?
01:27I said, Scooter!
01:30I said, Scooter, there are only two things I have to do in this world.
01:35Be cool and die.
01:37Mr. President, my motion is simple.
01:39It will prevent families with kids under 12 from losing food assistance under the bill.
01:44It's bad enough we're borrowing money, trillions of dollars from our kids and grandkids to pay for tax cuts for rich people,
01:51but it is worse still that we leave families hungry today.
01:55I reserve the balance of my time.
01:57Feeding hungry kids is not waste.
01:59And if we have to send this bill back to committee to fix it and bring it back so kids can get fed, we should do it.
02:06This bill is going to take lunches out of school cafeterias.
02:10It's going to mean hungry families.
02:12You can't pick a number like $200 billion out of thin air and say you can take that money for tax cuts
02:17and not leave a lot of American kids hungry.
02:20I urge an aye vote.
02:22There are a lot of government programs that haven't been looked at in a long time.
02:27We all acknowledge that 75% now of federal spending is what we call mandatory spending.
02:33Entitlement programs.
02:35Things that Congress doesn't annually appropriate for.
02:38And it continues to grow at an uncontrollable rate.
02:41In fact, the growth and the rate of Medicaid spending in the last five years have been 50%.
02:46That's not sustainable.
02:48We know that's not sustainable.
02:50And in the time I've been here, we have never, ever done anything to reform and improve and strengthen these programs
03:00that are growing at an unsustainable rate that will wreck our economy and wreck our country
03:04if we don't start making some changes.
03:06And so, yes, there are some improvements and reforms to Medicaid to make it more efficient,
03:13to make sure that the people who are supposed to benefit from Medicaid do,
03:18and that it doesn't go to people who shouldn't benefit from Medicaid.
03:20Now, most of the increase in spending in Medicaid has been in what we call the expansion population.
03:26And that's the number of people out there for whom states get a 90% reimbursement from the federal government.
03:32There's a small group on that side of the aisle, MAGA hard right-wingers,
03:36who are dictating what's happened, and all the rest of the senators on the Republican side,
03:42who know it's wrong, go along.
03:45A small group.
03:46They don't represent more than 10% of the American people,
03:49but they're dictating what this body does.
03:52A, because of the rules we have, a simple majority.
03:55But B, because our colleagues on the Republican side lack the courage of their convictions
04:02to do the right thing for the American people.
04:05It's outrageous.
04:07Cutting people's health care.
04:09Causing people to get sicker and to even die.
04:13Cutting people's health care so that it's certain, almost, that more people will die.
04:20Just to give tax breaks to billionaires.
04:23We heard what our colleague from North Carolina had to say about this bill.
04:27My guess is about half, maybe even more than half, of the Republicans in the Senate totally agree with him.
04:34But he had the courage to speak the truth.
04:37Mr. President, this bill is a farce.
04:39Imagine a bunch of guys sitting around a table and saying,
04:42I've got a great idea.
04:44Let's give $32,000 worth of a tax break to a millionaire,
04:48and we'll pay for it by taking health insurance away from lower-income and middle-income people.
04:54And to top it off, how about we cut food stamps?
04:58We cut SNAP.
04:59We cut food aid to people.
05:01It's a joke.
05:02I would say it was a joke, except it's not the least bit funny.
05:05I've been in this business of public policy now for 20 years.
05:09Eight years as governor, 12 years in the United States Senate.
05:12I have never seen a bill this bad.
05:15I have never seen a bill that is this irresponsible, regressive, and downright cruel.
05:21The legislation we're debating today would modestly increase the size of the child tax credit
05:29while leaving out more than 17 million children from the full credit.
05:37America's poorest children, whose families are struggling to make ends meet, receive nothing from this bill.
05:45Everywhere I go in Colorado, I meet parents who are working hard, often two and three jobs,
05:52just to keep their families' heads above water.
05:56Like Americans all across this country, Mr. President,
06:00they are wrestling with the legacy of 50 years of trickle-down economics
06:05that have benefited the wealthiest Americans while leaving working and middle-class families behind,
06:12which this bill does again.
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