A bill to designate the Pride flag as an authorized flag eligible for display at units of the National Park System, to express the sense of the Senate that the Pride flag should be on display at the Stonewall National Monument in the State of New York, and for other purposes.

Mr. President, I came to the floor 2 weeks ago to speak about illegal immigrant truckdrivers causing chaos on our roads. Earlier this month, a father, his two sons, and a family friend were killed on an Indiana highway when an illegal immigrant swerved his semitruck right into them.

Two weeks ago, when I came to the floor to speak about this, I asked how many more people would have to die before we get serious about deporting illegal immigrants, and I am absolutely devastated that we now have one more name since I spoke here 2 weeks ago to add to that count. Tragically, just last week, another Hoosier was killed on an Indiana highway by an illegal immigrant truckdriver in a horrific accident. Terry Schultz was a 64-year-old man who was killed by an illegal immigrant from India when the illegal truckdriver reportedly ran a red light. Although the truckdriver is now in ICE custody, nothing can bring back Terry Schultz.

I am tired of coming to this floor and sharing the news about people being killed on Indiana roads because of illegal immigrants. This is the eighth Hoosier killed by an illegal immigrant on an Indiana road in just the last 6 months, that I know of, and the seventh because of illegal immigrant truckdrivers, specifically.

This is a national crisis, and I am sick of it. We need real accountability and a major overhaul of the system. Too much blood has already been stained on Indiana's roads. Things need to change, and they need to change now.

Last night, President Trump delivered an incredible State of the Union Address. One of the President's guests was a little girl named Delilah Coleman. When Delilah was just 5 years old, she suffered life- changing injuries caused by an illegal immigrant driving a semitruck in California, and it was the Democrat State of California that gave the illegal immigrant his commercial driver's license.

She is one of way too many people who have been hurt or killed by illegal immigrant truckers on our roads. Eight Hoosiers have been seriously injured--again, that is just what I know of--on Indiana roads by illegal immigrant drivers in the past 6 months. And that is just the eight that we know of.

Thank God Delilah, whom we saw last night up in the Gallery, is recovering well. In honor of Delilah, President Trump called on Congress to pass the Delilah Law, which would bar any State in the country from granting an illegal immigrant a commercial driver's license.

Many illegal immigrants cannot speak English or read the basic road signs. They have no business being on our roads, especially not behind the wheel of a semitruck.

Well, today, I am answering President Trump's call, and today, I am introducing the Delilah Law in the U.S. Senate. The Delilah Law not only bars States from giving CDLs to illegal immigrants, but it also revokes all trucking licenses that are currently issued to illegals and mandates that the CDL knowledge and skills tests are only given in English. This is common sense.

This will be a commonsense law, and I hope that we will get a chance to vote on it in the Senate very soon.

Another way that we can make our roads safer is by aggressively going after chameleon carriers that are employing illegal drivers. As I said 2 weeks ago, when I spoke on the floor about this, chameleon carriers are trucking companies that, after being shut down or heavily fined, just disguise themselves by changing their name or address or Department of Transportation number to continue operating.

It turns out that the trucking company that employed the illegal immigrant who killed those four people earlier this month in Jay County--they were four Amish men--was a company called AJ Partners. And they have been put out of service after it was investigated by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and deemed a chameleon carrier. Since then, Secretary Sean Duffy and the Department of Transportation have shut down two other shady carriers connected to AJ Partners, as well as the sham school that helped the illegal immigrant get his CDL in the first place.

Last year, the Department of Transportation closed 7,500 sham commercial driver schools, known as CDL mills. The Department of Transportation has also placed 14,000 drivers out of service for English language proficiency violations. And I want to thank Secretary Duffy right here, right now, for his leadership. The Department of Transportation is cracking down, and what they are doing is making our roads safer because of it.

The carrier reportedly involved in the accident that killed Terry Schultz just last week was incorporated from an address in Greenwood, IN. That is the principal place of business for six other carriers. Six carriers at one address.

Earlier this week, I sent a letter to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and urged them to investigate carriers operating out of Greenwood and elsewhere in my home State. We need to know about chameleon carriers that are operating in Indiana and shut them down, and that is why, last week, my office announced the creation of the Truck Safety Tip Line. The tip line is for those who work in the trucking industry to report concerns about companies that are operating illegally, hiring drivers who can't read or speak English, and hiring drivers who are illegally in the country and without the proper licenses and documents. The tip line gives truckers and people working in the trucking industry a way to speak up when they see carriers that are breaking the law and putting lives at risk on the road.

Any reports that are submitted to the Truck Safety Tip Line will be reviewed and shared with the U.S. Department of Transportation and its Office of Inspector General to help protect roadway safety and ensure a fair and lawful trucking industry. But the job of keeping our roads safe depends on more than just government. We need everyone--but especially truckers--to help us out.

Look, Indiana sits at the crossroads of America. It is a proud slogan for our State. And as I said before, Indiana is the fifth busiest State in the country for commercial freight traffic. Each year, 724 million tons of freight travel through Indiana. The truckers who operate in Indiana and throughout the country keep our economy going and going strong. They help us get the food we eat and the clothes that we wear.

Over 90 percent of truckers in America voted in the 2024 election. They are patriotic and good people who love this country and care about what is going on in America. Law-abiding truckers care about law and order, and they are outraged by what is happening on our roads. They are tired of unsafe drivers and companies who hire illegal immigrants because they can pay them less and take good jobs away from hard- working Americans. Hard-working American truckers are tired of being turned away from jobs because carriers hire cheap foreign labor instead, and it shouldn't be this way.

So if you are a trucker and you have concerns about illegal trucking companies and practices, we want to hear from you. In fact, we need to hear from you. That is why I am encouraging truckers who are on the road or those who are in the business to visit our website, banks.senate.gov, where you can find the Truck Safety Tip Line in the top corner.

We can't wait any longer. We have to do everything that we can to deport illegal immigrants from this country and get them off of our roads. We cannot allow illegal immigrants to terrorize our roads and kill more innocent lives like we have seen happen over and over again. I can't tell you how many people I have heard from who have texted me recently and said that they are afraid to take their families on the road in their vehicle and drive on the highways because this keeps happening over and over again. It is a national crisis.

While Democrats continue to moan on and on about ICE, shutting down the Department of Homeland Security because of it, I will work to keep the people of Indiana safe from illegal immigrants, especially illegal immigrants who are behind the wheel of semitrucks.

The time to act is now. President Trump called on us to do something about this national crisis now. I hope that truckers will use the tip line to help keep our roads safe, and I hope that we will get to vote on the Delilah Law soon. It is long past time to do something about it.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the We Can't Wait Act, a bipartisan bill with my colleague from New Hampshire Senator Hassan. This legislation addresses a pressing and unnecessary hardship in our Social Security Disability Insurance Program. This program, known as SSDI, provides eligible individuals with benefits if they become disabled and are unable to work. Our bill would give eligible individuals with disabilities the option of bypassing the current 5-month waiting period and allow them to access the benefits that they have earned without further delay.

As my colleagues are aware, SSDI benefits are available only to those who have worked long enough and contributed sufficiently through payroll taxes to the Social Security Disability Insurance Trust Fund.

When an individual becomes disabled and meets the program's strict eligibility standards, he or she should be able to rely on the benefits that they paid for, benefits intended to provide critical support during a time of great need.

Imagine that you have worked for many years and you find that you have contracted a disease that is fatal and that you have very little time to live. Surely, you should be able to tap into what essentially is an insurance fund set up for people in exactly that situation. But because of the 5-month waiting period, there are individuals who receive no payments at all.

During those 5 months, no payments are made, even though the disability has been confirmed by the Social Security Administration. This delay prevents individuals from accessing the insurance they have earned, at a critical and difficult time in their lives.

Lack of benefits can make it more difficult to obtain timely medical treatments, cover basic living expenses, and, in some cases where it is not a terminal condition, begin the process of rehabilitation toward an eventual return to work, if possible.

The burden of this delay can be heartbreaking. I have heard from constituents whose loved ones could get no help from SSDI when they were overtaken by a sudden and terminal diagnosis. Faced with a terrible disease that demanded every ounce of their energy and their total focus, they were forced instead to worry over their finances at the very end of their lives.

This just isn't right. The broader disability determination process already imposes significant hardships. A 2020 Government Accountability Office report documented what can be severe consequences of the long wait times for applicants who appealed initial denials for a Social Security disability.

Between fiscal years 2014 and 2019, approximately 48,000 individuals were forced to file for bankruptcy while awaiting a final decision on their appeals. From 2008 through 2019, an estimated nearly 110,000 people died before receiving a final decision.

These heartbreaking outcomes occur even before many applicants reach the point of approval. Yet even once they are approved, the additional 5-month exclusion period compounds the suffering for those who have already proven their eligibility.

Congress has already acted to address this delay in certain circumstances. In 2020, we passed the ALS Disability Insurance Access Act. It eliminated the

5-month waiting period for individuals with ALS, a progressive, terminal disease where every month, every day is critical. That bipartisan reform was the right thing to do, and I was proud to cosponsor it.

The We Can't Wait Act builds directly on that precedent. Under our bill, claimants would have a choice. They could either opt to begin receiving benefits immediately after approval, rather than waiting 5 months, in exchange for a modest actuarially sound reduction in their monthly benefit amount, or they could decide to wait the 5 months and receive the full amount.

As the chief actuary of the Social Security Administration explains in a letter released today, this small reduction in benefits maintains the actuarial balance in the trust fund over the 75-year projection period.

Let me emphasize that this bill makes no other changes in the SSDI Program. It does not alter eligibility criteria, the determination process--although that should be speeded up--benefit levels for those who choose not to bypass the wait, or any other core element in the program.

It is a precise reform that honors the contributions hard-working Americans with disabilities have made while removing an arbitrary barrier to the benefits that they have earned and deserve.

While this reform is carefully targeted, its impact would be profound. It would end the tragic reality in which Americans with disabilities suffer and, in some cases, die during an unnecessary 5- month delay after their disability has been officially certified by the Social Security Administration.

This is a key point made in a letter supporting the bill by a broad coalition of organizations committed to the rights, dignity, and well- being of people with disabilities--groups that advocate every day for those who need this relief most.

The letter, which is signed by more than two dozen organizations, goes on to make the point that the 5-month exclusion period is unnecessary and harms disabled Americans who are often financially hanging on by a thread.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have the letter of endorsement from this coalition printed in the Record immediately following my remarks.

The We Can't Wait Act is straightforward, compassionate, and fiscally responsible. It would provide a crucial option to Americans who simply can't wait even 5 months for the benefits they have worked for and desperately need.

I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this commonsense and much needed legislation.