Bblg of. Mr. Sanders mr. President . The presiding officer the senator from vermont. Mr. Sanders thank you, mr. President. Mr. President , as everybody knows, the Republican Party now controls the u. S. House, the u. S. Senate, and the white house. We also know that unless a budget agreement is reached by december 22, the United States government will shut down, which will cause serious harm to our country, including the men and women in the armed forces and our veterans. Mr. President , i do not know why the Republican Party, which controls all the branches of government, wants to shut our government down. I think thats wrong. I think a shutdown will be very hurtful to people from coast to coast. Now, President Trump said earlier this year, he tweeted, quote, our country needs a good shutdown, end of quote. I strongly disagree. I dont think we need a good shutdown. I think we need to reach an agreement on a budget which works for the middle class of our country and not just the wealthiest people. Mr. President , it is no great secret that we are living in a nation which has almost unprecedented income and wealth inequality, at least since the 1920s. We have the top onetenth of 1 owning almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 . I dont believe that now is the time to give massive tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country in a horrific tax bill, and then at the end of ten years raise taxes on 83 million middleclass families. I think it makes no sense mr. President , could we have order. The presiding officer id ask colleagues to take their conversations off the floor. Mr. Sanders mr. President , i dont think it makes much sense to be passing a tax bill which gives 62 of the benefits to the top 1 . And apparently it is not good enough for my republican colleagues that Corporate America today is enjoying recordbreaking profits and that the c. E. O. s of large corporations are earning more than 300 times what their employees make. What the tax bill would do is give over a trillion dollars in tax breaks to large profitable corporations at a time when already one out of five of these major corporations are paying nothing in taxes. Thats apparently not good enough. Need to lower taxes for large corporations even more. Right now as we speak, legislation is being written behind closed doors by the House Freedom caucus and other members of the extreme right wing to provide a massive increase in funding for the pentagon for the rest of the fiscal year while only providing temporary and inadequate funding for the needs of the working families of this country, including education, affordable housing, nutrition, environmental protections, and other vital programs. In other words, what we have seen over the last year is a republican effort to throw 30 Million People off of Health Insurance. What we then see is a republican effort to give a trillion dollars in tax breaks to the top 1 and large corporations and at the end of ten years raise taxes on middleclass families. And now what we are seeing on the part of the Republican Party is an effort to increase military spending by 54 billion while ignoring the needs of a struggling middle class. Mr. President , we have got to get our priorities right and maybe, just maybe we have to start listening to what the American People want, not just what wealthy Campaign Contributors want. In terms of the republican socalled health care bill, the repeal of the Affordable Care act, massive opposition from the American People. In terms of this tax bill, mr. President , in case you havent seen the last few calls massive opposition to the tax bill, it raises taxes on the middle class. Maybe, just maybe, we start paying attention to the needs of working families. For a start, let us be clear that ever since the passage of the control budget act budget control act of 2011, we have operated democrats and republicans have agreed to operate with parity. That means if you are going to increase military spending, you increase the needs for the military families. That was parity before and parity three times after and parity must continue. It is not acceptable to talk a huge increase in military spending and not help a middle class that needs help in terms of education, nutrition, and so many other areas. Furthermore, the American People are quite clear, they want us to move to comprehensive immigration reform, and they understnd that it would be a terrible understand it would be a terrible thing to do to say to 800,000 young people who have lived in most cases their entire lives in the United States of america, to simply say to those people were ending the daca program. Youre going to lose your legal status. Youre not going to be able to go to school. Youre not going to be able to hold a job. Youre not going to be able to be in the military. Were taking away the legal status that you now have and you will be subject to deportation. That is it not what the American People want. They want to continue the daca program. They want comprehensive immigration form. Reform. Now is the time to deal with that and im happy to say that on this issue there is a growing number of republicans in the house and in the senate who understand that in america youre not going to throw 800,000 of our youngest and brightest people and keeping them out of this country. Mr. President , i have been deeply involved, as senator blunt has, and others in the Community HealthCenter Program that is so important for the people of our country. 27 Million People receive their health care from Community Health centers which provides not just primary care but Mental Health counseling, provide dental care and lowcost Prescription Drugs. But while my republican colleagues have been busy trying to throw 30 Million People off of Health Insurance while theyve been busy trying to give 1 there will in tax breaks to the rich and large corporations, somehow they have not had the time to extend the chip program or the comiewrnt health Community Health centers. How can we talk about tax breaks for billionaires and not extending a Health Insurance program for the children of our country. If the chip program is not reauthorized, nine million children in working families will lose their Health Insurance. Let us get our priorities right. Let us immediately pass legislation, extending and funding the chip program and the Community HealthCenter Program. Mr. President , in the midwest, as you well know, and all over this country, we have a major crisis in terms of pensions. So many of our Older Workers are scared to death about retiring because they have very little or nothing in the bank as they end their work careers. If congress does not act soon, the earned pension benefits of more than 1. 5 million workers and retirees in multiemployer Pension Plans could be cut up to 60 . People who have worked their entire lives, people who have put money in a Pension Program, people who have given up wage increases in order to gain decent pensions, now have the possibility of seeing their pensions cut by up to 60 . How can you do that how can you that . How can you tell somebody that was looking forward to a decent retirement that their pension could be cut up to 60 . When an employee is promised a pension after a lifetime of hard work, Congress Needs to act. Congress needs to act to make sure that no one in america in a multiworker Pension Program will see a cut. We need to make a downpayment on universal child care. In my state of vermont, all over this country, increasing difficult for working families to find highquality, affordable child care. We must, in my view, double the funding for the child care and Development Block grant to provide child care assistance for 226,000 more children and move forward universal child care for every kid in america. What the social scientists tell us is there is no better investment than investing in Early Childhood education. Every dollar we invest in that comes back to us by kids getting jobs. Mr. President , there is another crisis that has to be dealt with. Ten years ago Congress Passed the Loan Forgiveness Program to support americans who end their Public Service careers, nurses, teachers, firefighters, social workers, and military personnel. One of the absurdities that exists in America Today is that we have tens of millions of americans who are paying outrageous Interest Rates on their student debt. People who have done the right thing by trying to get the best education they could are now being punished because they went to college, went to graduate school by having to pay a significant part of their income back to the government in terms of their student debt. Congress must address this issue, and there is legislation to make sure that at the very least if you are prepared to go into Public Service work you want to be a teacher, nurse, firefighter, police officer, social worker, go into the military we will forgive your debt. That should be dealt with before the end of the year. Mr. President , we have a crisis in terms of our rural infrastructure. I come from a rural state. In the year 2017, p soon to be 2018, how is it that in Rural Communities all over america that there is inadequate broadband . How can you have a company if you dont have that, how can a kid do well in school if you cant gain access to the internet. This is the United States of america. We should not be trailing countries all over the world who have better Broadband Access at a lower cost than we do. If you want to grow in rural america, if you want our kids to stay in rural america, we have to deal with the lapsing infrastructure in this country and especially in rural america. Mr. President , i dont have to tell you because ohio has been hit hard as has vermont, new hampshire, all over this country, we have a terrible, terrible epidemic in terms of opioid addiction. I just im trying to deal with this issue in the state of vermont. I know its severe in ohio. We have to be adequately funding programs which focus on prevention, making sure that our young people do not get trapped into a life of addition. We have to be providing the kinds of treatment that people need. We cannot ignore this. This is an epidemic that is sweeping this country. More people will die this year from opioid overdoses than died during the entire war in vietnam. We have to adequately Fund Treatment and preventation for the epidemic were seeing in terms of the opioids. We have to deep our promises to the veterans. We have tens of thousands of positions at the Veterans Administration that have not been filled and we need to make sure that they are filled, so that the veterans of our country when they go into the v. A. Get highquality care in a timely matter that they are entitled to. Mr. President , there was an article, i think it was in the Washington Post a couple of weeks ago. It talked about the fact that 10,000 people 10,000 people died in the last year waiting for a decision on Social Security disability benefits. You have people who desperately need these benefits, they applied for these benefits through the Social Security administration, and they wait and they wait and they wait, and unbelievably in the last year 10,000 people died while they were waiting for a decision from the Social Security administration. This has everything to do with the fact that there have been budget cuts in recent years that have been significant and have resulted in the loss of more than 10,000 employees in the Social Security security administration, the closing of 64 field offices, and reduced hours in many others. In vermont, one field office has seen its staff cut by 30 . We have to adequately fund the Social Security administration so our elderly and disabled can get due process in terms of the benefits that they file. Mr. President , 2016, the National Park service recorded over 330 million visits to the National Parks. In other words, our National Parks are very, very popular, but they are not getting the Maintenance Work that they need. Meanwhile, the president wants to double fees for people visiting our beautiful National Parks. This is an issue that we must address. Bottom line here is we are coming toward the end of the year and we have got a lot of work to do, but the work that we do has got to start reflecting the needs of the working people of this country, not just the billionaire class. We cannot give 54 billion more to the military and ignore the needs of our children, our elderly, our sick, our poor. We have got to come up with a Budget Proposal which works for all of us and not just wealthy Campaign Contributors, and as a member of the budget committee, i intend to be very active in that process. With that, mr. President , i would yield the floor. Ms. Klobuchar mr. President. The presiding officer the senator from minnesota. Ms. Klobuchar mr. President , i stand today to call for bipartisan action on several things that are really critical. One of them has really become routine since it started as something, a bill that democrats and republicans did together, and that was the childrens Health Insurance program, something that my colleague from vermont has referenced. In my state, we have been a Good Government state. We have had a Budget Surplus for years, and believe it or not, we relied on the fact that congress would come through and do what they were supposed to do and reauthorize the childrens Health Insurance program, but that didnt happen. And so, as a result, we have a slight budget deficit, something we havent had for years, but it just to me really hit home the fact when i called our budget director in the state, and i said, how did this happen when we had these surpluses. And he said, well, we actually thought you guys would reauthorize the childrens Health Insurance program, but you didnt. Instead, what we have seen is a tax bill that adds over 1 trillion to the debt. Even when you take into account any economic gain from that bill, a Nonpartisan Group said that it would, in fact, add 100 trillion to the debt. Thats what were doing instead of reauthorizing the childrens Health Insurance program. This makes no sense to me. So funding for chip expired more than two months ago even though, as i said, its one of our Success Stories out of this congress. Both parties have come together for years to support this program that provides health care to millions of children across the country. In minnesota, these funds support coverage for more than 125,000 kids, but just last week my state estimated that failing to reauthorize chip would cost us 178 million. Thats why the deficit was at 188 million. So the chip funding that our state has come to rely on through democratic president s, republican president s has suddenly gone away. And thats why we have a deficit while at the same time a decision has been made by my colleagues on the other side to add over a trillion dollars to the debt. I dont know what to tell the people in my state except that that appears to be a priority. The tax cuts for the wealthy than reauthorizing this bill to help kids get their Health Insurance. Guess what . They dont understand that reasoning. States like mine are running out of ways to make federal funding last a little bit longer. Every single day that we dont act puts coverage at risk for millions of kids. Some states have already been forced to tell parents to start making other plans for their kids health care. No parent should ever have to worry about whether their child will have health care. We must keep this Strong Program going. Ive also heard from families with kids who get treatment at the childrens hospitals and clinics of minnesota who count on this program for the medical care that they need. So