Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, the dismissal of Director Comey has raised a bevy of troubling questions over the

last few days. The President of the United States fired the man in charge of an active investigation about the President and his campaign ties to Russia. The truth is, the dismissal of Director Comey is part of a much longer pattern of this administration's interfering with or removing the people who are in a position to conduct an independent investigation of the President and his administration.

The administration requested that the chairmen of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees help them beat back reports in the press about the Russia probe. The administration picked this Attorney General--a very close political ally, then-Senator Jeff Sessions--to lead a Justice Department that was supposed to independently conduct this investigation.

Attorney General Sessions, of course, has since had to recuse himself from the Russia investigation after he misled Congress about his meetings with the Russian Ambassador.

The administration is not shy about removing independent prosecutors and law enforcement officers from their posts if they are simply doing something the President doesn't like, even if it is required by law. They fired Sally Yates. They fired Preet Bharara. They fired more than 40 U.S. attorneys across the country. Now they have fired Director Comey.

This is about more than just Mr. Comey. This is about a pattern of events that casts tremendous doubt on whether this administration has any interest in allowing the Russia investigation or any other investigation that could be politically damaging to them to proceed unimpeded. This is about one of the most sacred things we believe in as Americans, the rule of law--the rule of law being threatened here.

We in Congress, in both parties, should have one overarching goal: to get the full unvarnished truth. That means getting to the bottom of the events that led to Mr. Comey's dismissal and making sure the Russia investigation is conducted impartially. Here in Congress, the Senate Intelligence Committee is doing its investigation in a bipartisan way, but the executive branch investigation has been compromised.

Attorney General Sessions, who had to recuse himself from the Russia investigation, played a significant role in firing the man who was leading it. Not only that, but the Attorney General is now reportedly leading a search to replace Mr. Comey. He is helping select the next FBI Director, who will be in charge of an investigation he cannot oversee--what an irony.

This Attorney General shouldn't be anywhere near the hiring process of the next FBI Director. His role will jaundice the entire process, if it hasn't already.

In order to ensure the American people can have faith in the impartiality of the investigation, it must be conducted far from the reach of the White House. It is the overwhelming view of my caucus that a special prosecutor should now be appointed to conduct the investigation into the Trump campaign's ties to Russia.

This special prosecutor should be appointed by the highest ranking civil servant at the Justice Department. Mr. Rosenstein and other political appointees should not be the ones who decide on a special prosecutor, lest that decision be seen as influenced, or worse, made at the direction of the administration. I thank my colleague from California, Senator Feinstein, for speaking so eloquently on this proposal.

In addition, there are several things that should happen here on Capitol Hill that will help get us to the bottom of the events this week.

First, Mr. Comey should testify before Congress. There are so many questions that only Mr. Comey can answer. So I applaud Senators Burr and Warner for inviting him to appear before the Intelligence Committee next week. It was the right thing to do. We ought to hear from Mr. Comey, and I urge Mr. Comey to come and tell the whole story.

Second, Attorney General Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein should make themselves available to Congress. I am renewing my request of the majority leader to call an all-Senators briefing where they can answer the questions swirling about from Tuesday night's firing. Attorney General Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein should appear separately and partially in a classified setting if necessary, but they must come.

Mr. Rosenstein has played a central role in all of these events. He could help clear up questions about where the decision to fire Mr. Comey originated. So later today, separate and apart from my request that he come before the Senate, I will be sending Mr. Rosenstein a letter with a list of questions for him to answer publicly. America needs to hear them. Many Democrats voted for Mr. Rosenstein a few weeks ago because he had a reputation for integrity. He assured us he would be an independent force inside the Department of Justice, and 94 Senators voted for him, but the events of last week have made many of us question that belief. He owes it to the Senate. He owes it to the people he supervises in the Justice Department and in the FBI, and he owes it to the American people to provide some answers.

In sum, we demand the appointment of a special prosecutor by a nonpolitical appointee at the Department of Justice. We want to hear from Mr. Comey. We are asking the majority leader to hold separate all- Senators briefings with the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General. This would help us get a hold on what happened, would explain why, and would help guide us in what to do next because this investigation will not die no matter who wants it to. I sincerely hope we will get an answer from the majority leader by the end of the day. This is a very serious matter.

Right now, there are two different stories coming out of the White House. Some are saying the decision to fire Mr. Comey came directly from the White House; others, including the Vice President, have said it came from the Department of Justice--specifically, Mr. Rosenstein and Mr. Sessions. We need to resolve these two story lines on something as important as this. We need the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. So I hope my Republican colleagues see the wisdom and value in our request and respond appropriately by the end of the day.

Mr. President, just a word on the majority's use of the Congressional Review Act. The window for using the CRA is closing this week. I heard the majority leader touting the 13 CRAs the majority passed this year. I want to make two points.

First, despite what the majority leader and the President claim, these CRAs are not a huge accomplishment. They simply overturned rules passed at the very end of the Obama administration. They hardly constitute a legislative agenda. In fact, the use of the CRA shows just how little this majority and this President have been able to accomplish in the first 100-plus days. The fact that they are bragging about these highlights how little else they have accomplished legislatively.

Second, the CRAs are designed to help special interests against the interests of working Americans, belying all the promises President Trump made when he campaigned. Let me give some examples. One of them is on foreign oil bribery. One of them is on a retirement rule. One of them is on stream protections. One is on mentally-ill access to guns. In each of these, it is a narrow special interest who pushed it, not a demand from the American people. Which Americans say ``Make it OK for our companies to bribe foreign oil companies or pollute our streams'' or ``Give the mentally ill access to guns''? These are narrow interests in each case.

Let's be very clear about this. The CRAs Republicans passed are not rolling back burdensome regulations. Oh, no. They are giveaways to Big Oil, Big Gas, Big Coal, Big Mining, and wealthy special interests.

The most indefensible one of many is the one on a retirement rule. If localities or States want to set up systems whereby working people want to put money away for their retirement, why not? It doesn't hurt anybody. It doesn't require anybody to do anything. And these days where fewer and fewer Americans have pensions from their companies, it is what is needed. But

some banks didn't want competition. They didn't want it shown that maybe the cities or the States could run these retirement systems more cheaply and take less money out of the average American's pocket. So we undid this rule. I don't think a single average constituent in any part of America wanted this rule undone, just the big banks--some of them, not all of them. That is the kind of thing my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and President Trump are bragging about. It is nothing to brag about.

Let's be very clear about this. These are not the priorities the American people voted for in November, where a substantial majority of Americans said in exit polls that the economy was rigged against them. These CRAs rig the game even further for the wealthy special interests and are nothing to brag about or write home about.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, before the Senate adjourns for the weekend, I wish to address a few things related to the dismissal of FBI Director James Comey.

The story coming out of the White House about why Mr. Comey was fired continues to change and there are no good explanations for the change.

For 2 days, the White House implied that the decision to fire Mr. Comey either originated or was largely influenced by the recommendations from the Deputy Attorney General and the Attorney General. The Vice President of the United States spoke to reporters here on Capitol Hill and said that it was the President's ``decision to accept the recommendation of the Deputy Attorney General and the Attorney General to remove Director Comey.''

Those accounts, by the spokespeople of the President and the Vice President himself, were just blatantly and completely contradicted by the President himself on national television.

President Trump told NBC News that it was his decision to fire Mr. Comey, and he had made up his mind to do so before hearing from either the Attorney General or the Deputy Attorney General, in direct contradiction to what his own Vice President and his own press people were saying.

Well, which one was it? Did the Vice President mislead the public or did the President? When was the decision made to fire Mr. Comey, and what was the reason? And why did it take so long for the White House to get its story straight?

These are all critical questions, and the American people deserve answers. We need to understand the true nature of the events that led to Director Comey's dismissal, why it happened, and what it means for the investigation into the potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia as we move forward.

This morning, I made a request of the majority leader to call an all- Senators briefing with Attorney General Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein. Given the events of this week, and particularly after what the President said this afternoon, a briefing from these two officials before the whole Senate, where Senators from both parties can ask and get answers to the serious questions hanging over us, is imperative for this body and for the American people. The all-Senators briefing with the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General should be separate and partially classified, if necessary.

The need for these briefings is even greater now than it was this morning, given what the President said this afternoon. The rule of law, the separation of powers, and their strength--hallmarks of American democracy--are at stake.

Now, I have just heard from the majority leader that he will invite Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to an all-Senators briefing next week. I asked the majority leader to do the briefing early in the week. It is a good first step, and I thank the majority leader for consenting to this request.

Mr. Rosenstein was here on the Hill today meeting with Members. He requested to meet with me, and I said I wanted to meet with him along with my 99 colleagues so Members of both parties were given the opportunity to question him. I am glad he has a willingness to come talk to Congress, and I hope he will accept our bipartisan invitation from Leader McConnell and from me to brief the entire Senate next week.

My caucus still believes that Attorney General Sessions must be made available to the Senate in a similar capacity, given his reported role in firing Director Comey and helping select his replacement. Considering his recusal from the Russia investigation, his close involvement in these events warrants the Senate's questioning as well, but I thank the majority leader for trying to set up the briefing with Mr. Rosenstein. It is very likely, I believe, that it will happen, just pending Mr. Rosenstein's consent, and I hope the majority leader soon comes to the right decision and grants our request to question Mr. Sessions as well.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, yesterday the President fired the Director of the FBI, Jim Comey, who was leading an active investigation into the Trump campaign's possible collusion with Russia.

The President provided no reasoning for the firing other than he had the recommendation of his Attorney General--who has already had to recuse himself from the Russia investigation for being too close to the President--and his Deputy Attorney General, Rod Rosenstein.

There is little reason to think Mr. Rosenstein's letter is the true reason President Trump fired Director Comey. Why? Because if the administration truly had objections to the way Director Comey handled the Clinton investigation, they would have had them the minute the President got into office, but he didn't fire Director Comey then.

The question is, Why did it happen last night? We know Director Comey was leading an investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians, a serious offense. Were those investigations getting too close to home for the President?

The dismissal of Director Comey establishes a very troubling pattern. This administration has now removed several law enforcement officials in a position to conduct independent investigations of the President and his administration--from Acting Attorney General Sally Yates to Preet Bharara and now Jim Comey.

What should happen now, what must happen now is that Mr. Rosenstein appoints a special prosecutor to oversee this investigation. Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein sat in the Judiciary Committee and promised to appoint a special prosecutor at the appropriate time. He said: ``I'm willing to appoint a special counsel whenever I determine that it's appropriate.''

My colleague Senator Coons asked him: ``Would you agree that it's vital to the assurance of confidence in our democracy and law enforcement system that any investigation into these matters be fair, free, thorough and politically independent?''

Mr. Rosenstein answered: ``Yes, I do.''

If there was ever a time when circumstances warranted a special prosecutor, it is right now.

Mr. Rosenstein already expressed concern that Director Comey damaged the integrity of the FBI. The Attorney General has already had to recuse himself from the investigation for being too close to the President.

If Mr. Rosenstein is true to his word, that he believes this investigation must be ``fair, free, thorough and politically independent,'' if he believes, as I do, that the American people must be able to have faith in the impartiality of this investigation, he must appoint a special prosecutor and get his investigation out of the hands of the FBI and far away from the heavy hand of this administration.

Mr. Rosenstein has the authority to appoint a special prosecutor right now. He needs no congressional authorization. This would simply be a step that he could take, as outlined in the Department of Justice guidelines and in a law passed after Watergate, to get an independently minded prosecutor who would be insulated from various pressures.

A special prosecutor is not subject to day-to-day supervision by the Attorney General or anyone else at the Justice Department. That means the special prosecutor would have much greater latitude in whom he can subpoena, which questions they can ask, and how to conduct an investigation. The special prosecutor can only be removed for good cause, such as misconduct, not to quash the investigation.

Third, there is built-in congressional oversight. Congress is notified whenever a special counsel is appointed, removed, or has finished with the investigation. The appointment of a special prosecutor would be a welcome step in the right direction, but it is not the only action that should be taken.

There are a great many outstanding questions about the circumstances of Director Comey's dismissal, the status of the executive branch investigation into the Trump campaign ties to Russia, and what the future holds for these investigations.

So I will be requesting that the majority leader call a closed, and if necessary, classified, all-Senators briefing, with the Attorney General separately at which, and the Deputy Attorney General separately, at which they can be asked questions.

Some of the questions: Why was Attorney General Sessions, who had recused himself from the Russia investigations, able to influence the firing of the man conducting the Russia investigation? Did Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein act on his own or at the direction of his superiors or the White House? Are reports that the President has been searching for a rationale to fire the FBI Director for weeks true? Was Director Comey's investigation making significant progress in a direction that would cause political damage for the White House? Why didn't the President wait for the Inspector General's investigation into Director Comey's handling of the Clinton email investigation to conclude before making his decision to fire him? Was this really about something else?

No doubt, we will have an opportunity to question Mr. Comey, now a private citizen, about what happened, but we need to hear from this administration about what happened and why, and what is going to happen next. That is why, again, I am requesting that the majority leader call a closed, and if necessary, classified, all-Senators briefing with the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General separately, at which they can be asked these questions.

I hope the majority leader agrees with me that we need to get to the bottom of this and get a handle on all the facts so that we can grapple with them. I remind him and my Republican friends that nothing less is at stake than the American people's faith in our criminal justice system and the integrity of the executive branch of our government.

I yield the floor.

Given that we have no path forward on the horrible and momentous events of last night from the majority, I am constrained to object.

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

Thank you, Mr. President.

First, I want to thank my colleague from Colorado for his outstanding remarks and, even much more important, the work on the methane CRA. Much is happening today, and not many people paid much attention, I guess, because they were so busy, but this is the first CRA to go down, and it is probably the most important one that came before us. So the fact that it wasn't voted on means the people of America and the people of the world can breathe a sigh of relief because methane--one of the great causes of global warming--will not be released into the atmosphere as easily.

Mr. President, first I wish to thank my friend and our great Senator from Massachusetts, Mr. Markey, for the great work he has done on the opioid issue. He was one of the first to sound the alarm when prescription drugs just began to be overprescribed and has worked very, very hard, with many successes, in trying to deal with this problem. We have a long way to go. Things would have been a lot worse without the great work of the Senator from Massachusetts.

I see my colleague from New Hampshire on the floor, as well, and the same goes for her. She has done an outstanding job. She has worked and campaigned on this issue and is keeping her promises, working very hard here in the U.S. Senate. We know that their States are among the top States with opioid abuse problems.

Mr. President, at yesterday's Judiciary Committee hearing, we heard from former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. In their testimony, both of them confirmed what we already know--that Russia tried to interfere in our elections and likely will do so again. Underline ``likely will do so again.''

In particular, Deputy AG Yates made the point that General Flynn misled the Vice President about his contact with the Russian Ambassador and was vulnerable to blackmail since the Russians knew about those conversations.

It is still an open question whether or not the Trump administration will hold General Flynn accountable under our criminal law. Needless to say, his presence in the administration and the length of time it took to dismiss him raise serious questions about why the President brought him onboard to begin with and why the President and his staff did not respond more quickly to protect our national security.

Both parties in Congress should be focused on the threat posed by Russia's hacking activities and Russia's attempt to influence foreign elections, especially ours. Make no mistake about it. These cyber attacks will not be limited to any one party or any President. Anyone who draws the ire of President Putin--President, Senator, Member of Congress, elected official--could be subject to these dark attacks. Whatever is good for Russia at the moment, whatever hurts the United States the most, that is what he will pursue.

Director Clapper testified that Russia likely feels ``emboldened'' to continue its hacking activities, given their success at disrupting our 2016 elections. He said:

If there has ever been a clarion call for vigilance and

action against a threat to the very foundation of our

democratic political system, this episode is it.

Those are his words, not mine.

I hope the American people recognize the severity of this

threat and that we collectively counter it before it further

erodes the fabric of our democracy.

I couldn't agree more with Mr. Clapper. I hope these hearings are just the start of a bipartisan discussion on how to combat these efforts and safeguard the integrity of our elections. Democrats and Republicans should join together and figure out what Russia had done to us in the past and how we prevent it from happening in the future. Again, as Director Clapper said, the very foundation of our democracy is at stake.

The Founding Fathers, in their wisdom, wrote in the Constitution that we had to worry about foreign interference. It is happening now in a way that has never happened before, and in a bipartisan way we must act.

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

Mr. President, first I want to thank the majority leader for speaking about the agreement that the House and Senate came to on the appropriations bills, the spending bills. We may not agree on emphasis and what the most important things are, but we certainly agree that it was a good effort that moved things forward, and I was proud to be part of it.

Mr. President, I note another thing that might tie the majority leader and the minority leader together--pride in Saturday's Kentucky Derby. The majority leader is very proud of the Kentucky Derby. It is one of the leading events in his State. I know he attends religiously.

I am particularly proud because the horse that won was owned and trained and guided by two Brooklynites. I salute them for their success. Vinnie Viola, one of the two, is a close friend of mine. I have known him for a long time, and I know him well. As many of you know, he was being considered for Secretary of the Army. He would have been a good one. He withdrew because of the financial issues that he was too involved in with companies he owned, but he is a good man. He comes from St. Cecilia's Parish on the Greenpoint-Williamsburg border of Brooklyn. We are all proud and hope that his horse goes all the way. Maybe I can be at Belmont and see him win the Triple Crown. Anyway, that is a nice link between the majority leader and the minority leader.

Mr. President, yesterday, the people of France took part in a time- honored tradition of a democratic people: the election of a new President. We here in the Senate congratulate Emmanuel Macron on his win and look forward to the continuing deep and longstanding friendship between our two countries.

Unfortunately, the elections in France were victim to a malicious attempt to distort the results through a coordinated cyber attack on one of the candidates, much as Hillary Clinton's campaign was targeted in our elections. In the waning days of the French election, according to reports, Macron's emails were hacked and leaked to the public, potentially with some altered information included, by agents believed to originate in Russia. The hack was then promoted and spread by far- right activists around the globe, some of whom reside here in the United States. It was deja vu all over again. Russia elevated old school propaganda tactics and techniques using new school methods, spreading misinformation with an army of paid ``trolls'' and computer bots, aided and abetted by far-right activists here in the United States.

It seems that Putin and the international far right have formed an unholy alliance. The goal of this alliance is not necessarily to promote one candidate over another, one party over another, though that is part of it. Their true goal is to destabilize and subvert democratic societies, to cast doubt on the outcome of free and fair elections, to hobble democratically elected leaders before they even take office, and to degrade the alliances and international regimes that have created so much stability, strength, and shared prosperity in the post-World War II era.

Despite Macron's win yesterday, we would be foolish to think that this unholy alliance will not use the same tactics again in upcoming European elections and, even more important to those of us in this country, in upcoming American elections.

Make no mistake about it--Mr. Putin has no loyalty to any one person or President. Whatever is good for Russia at the moment, whatever hurts the United States the most, that is what he will pursue. This is an issue that should provoke grave concern in both parties. He may favor one party one day and another party the next. It should compel us, together--Democrats and Republicans--to take action against this new threat.

This afternoon, the Judiciary Committee will hear from former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Later this week, the Intelligence Committee will hold its annual worldwide threats hearing. I sincerely hope these two committees will cover these issues in their hearings and beyond.

We should begin an extended bipartisan discussion about how to combat foreign information operations campaigns and safeguard the integrity of democratic elections all over the world and, most importantly, in our own country. It is no less serious than this: The integrity of our democracy, which has thrived, blessedly, for over 240 years could well be at stake.

Now, Mr. President, on healthcare, last week House Republicans passed the latest version of TrumpCare after a failed attempt earlier this year. When they see this version, the majority of Americans will think it is even worse than the first version.

This partisan bill will dramatically increase the cost of health insurance for those who need it most, including older Americans, and lower the quality of coverage.

TrumpCare would mean 24 million fewer Americans will be without health insurance.

It would hike premiums by 20 percent in the first few years, and average costs for the middle class could go up by more than $1,500 a year. Middle-class people can't afford that kind of money. If you are struggling to make it into the middle class, TrumpCare could raise your costs by up to $4,000, putting you in an even worse pickle.

It makes it possible for insurers to charge older Americans as much as five times the amount they charge younger people, and States could make this ratio even greater if they wanted. Under the first TrumpCare bill, someone making about $20,000 could have his or her--someone who is 63 years old--premiums go up from something like $1,500 or $2,000 all the way to over $10,000 a year. This will be devastating for senior citizens, those 50 to 65. At 65, they get Medicare. They are in decent shape. But when they are older and not under Medicare, they could get clobbered by this bill after working so hard. And that is the time when you start getting susceptible to so many serious illnesses.

TrumpCare would devastate our rural areas by decimating Medicaid, which rural areas rely on. Limiting subsidies to lower income Americans, many of whom live in rural areas, TrumpCare would put insurance for rural Americans even further out of reach.

Many rural hospitals are the largest employers in their areas. We have many in New York State, in Upstate New York. They would be shortchanged by this bill. These hospitals--often the largest employers in our rural counties and the only providers of healthcare for scores and sometimes hundreds of miles around--might be forced to lay off thousands of workers. Many of these rural hospital leaders say that if TrumpCare passed, they would have to close. There would be hundreds out of work in an area where it is not easy to find work, and for those who don't work in the hospitals, it would be harder to get to the hospitals. We all know how important it is to get there quickly when, God forbid, a stroke or some other serious illness occurs.

Maybe most troubling of all, TrumpCare would now eliminate crucial consumer protections in our healthcare system, including the ones that protect Americans with preexisting conditions. Every family in this country knows someone who has a preexisting condition. That sounds like a fancy word. What does it mean? Diabetes, chronic asthma, cancer, things like that. If you live in a State that opts out of this requirement, you will have to jump through so many hoops to maintain access to care, and even then it likely won't be affordable. It is unimaginable. You are a parent. Let's say you are 40 years old, husband and wife, and your child gets cancer. You can't get the coverage that under present law the insurance company has to give you or keep with you, and you watch your child suffer. That is inhumane.

How, for ideological purposes, the folks in the House could have first eliminated it and now made it almost unattainable for so many millions of Americans--unfathomable. We fixed the problem in our healthcare system because we had heard so many horrible stories. The Republican bill brings it back from the dead.

The way the House bill was put together in such a secretive and slapdash way, it is barely legislation. It well could be a menace to millions of American families. It means that the Senate should not even come close to passing a bill like this. It makes healthcare for working families, rural Americans, older Americans, and veterans much poorer and at the same time gives massive tax breaks to the wealthy. Some say that is the motivation of some in the House. To pay for these tax breaks for people making over $250,000 a year--and they get a big break--cut back healthcare on everybody else or on so many others. That is wrong. That is wrong.

It does, frankly, exactly the opposite of everything President Trump promised he would do on healthcare. He said: Lower costs, better care, insuring everyone. His words. President Trump said he would not cut Medicare or Medicaid. His bill does both. TrumpCare is a giant broken promise for the working people, the hard-working people of this great country of ours.

House Republicans rushed it through without hearings and without much debate or even a final CBO score. The final version was posted 8 hours before Members had to vote on it. Some of the very same Republicans who during the ObamaCare debate chanted ``Read the bill'' didn't even look at the final legislation, let alone study it. That is a breathtakingly irresponsible thing to do on a bill that will affect almost one-fifth of our economy and the healthcare of millions of Americans. I am not surprised our Republican colleagues wanted to rush it through. The more the American people see it, the less they will like it, just like with their first bill, which is why the first bill didn't pass and why the second one is in so much trouble here in the Senate.

To borrow Speaker Ryan's catchphrase, there is a better way to reform our healthcare system. Instead of a partisan process, rushing through bills in the dead of night--no hearings, no debate, no score, no input from the other party--both parties could start working together on improving our healthcare system.

Now that the bill is in the Senate's hands, we hope the Republican majority will pursue a bipartisan approach. If they drop their repeal efforts, which are already causing such uncertainty that insurers are pledging to hike rates on Americans next year, we Democrats are willing to work with our Republican colleagues to improve our healthcare system.

In the last few years, we have made a good deal of progress. We have made major improvements in our healthcare system, expanding coverage for over 20 million Americans, bending the cost curve, and protecting folks with preexisting conditions. Why don't we keep all the good things we have in the system and work on making it even better in a bipartisan way? We want to improve quality, lower costs, reduce the price of prescription drugs, and expand coverage for all Americans. Unfortunately, the House bill does exactly the opposite.

I hope my Republican friends toss this House bill out the window and resist the temptation to follow the same partisan, rushed process. I hope my friends on the other side of aisle drop repeal, which is hurting our healthcare system right now--just the threat of it--and start working with Democrats to make our healthcare better.

Mr. President, yesterday afternoon the House approved the Omnibus appropriations bill that will fund the government through September. The bill is the result of weeks and weeks of bipartisan, bicameral negotiations, and the final product reflects the give-and- take of those negotiations. Again, I want to thank the majority leader for all of his hard work and his desire to come to a good agreement, as well as the House leaders and the leadership of the Appropriations Committees. It has proved to many that Washington can work when we work together.

In my view, this is a very good bill for the American people. Not only does it explicitly preclude funding for an unnecessary and ineffective border wall, it excludes over 160 poison pill riders, it increases investments in programs that the middle class relies on, such as medical research, education, and infrastructure.

The National Institutes of Health will get an additional $2 billion-- part of the Cancer Moonshot. Pell grants will be restored for over 1 million students. Infrastructure programs like CDBG and TIGER will get an increase. Programs to combat the terrible scourge of opioid abuse will receive an increase. Clean energy research will receive an increase. Ninety-nine percent of the EPA's budget was protected.

In addition, there is a permanent extension of miners' health benefits, thanks to the hard work of Joe Manchin and so many others; funding to shore up Puerto Rico's Medicaid Program and a mechanism to allow the island to restructure its debt; and funding to help States like California, West Virginia, Louisiana, and North Carolina recover from natural disasters. It

has a very good increase for NASA, which I will talk about at the end of my remarks before my colleague from Florida speaks about the hard and successful work he has done on the NASA budget.

Of course, the bill doesn't include all of the things we wanted. It doesn't include all of the things our Republican colleagues wanted. That is the nature of compromise. But at the end of the day, this is an agreement which reflects our basic principles, and it is something both Democrats and Republicans should support.

The bill shows how bipartisanship in Congress should work--both parties negotiating in good faith in order to find consensus. It passed in the House with an overwhelming bipartisan majority of 309 votes, and I expect it will receive the Senate's approval later today.

More broadly, I hope this deal provides a blueprint for future budget negotiations between our two parties here in Congress. If the four corners--the Senate and House Democrats and Republicans--work as well on the 2018 budget as we did on the 2017 budget, we will have a product we can be proud of, with no worries about any kind of government shutdown.

TrumpCare

Mr. President, on healthcare, as the House plans to vote on their new vision and version of TrumpCare later today, I just want to remind the American people of a few things.

We are now on the second major attempt to pass TrumpCare. While all the focus in the media has been on the changes to the bill, we shouldn't forget the bad things that stay in the underlying bill and what they would mean for millions of Americans.

Under the new bill, as under the old, TrumpCare would mean that premiums go up 20 percent in the first few years. Average costs go up by over $1,500 a year on the middle class.

It would mean that if you are struggling to make it into the middle class with an income, say, around $30,000 a year, your costs could go up by $3 or $4,000.

It would mean insurers could charge older Americans five times or more the amount charged to younger folks. Even the 1-to-5 ratio, as bad as it was, as much as it raised the hackles of the members of the AARP and senior citizens, the 54- through 64-year-olds throughout America-- this bill makes that worse.

It would devastate Medicaid, a program that covers 68 million Americans. That would affect poor people in the inner cities, but it would also affect people in nursing homes, and the young men and women aged 45 to 50 who have parents in nursing homes are going to have to face an awful choice--more money out of their pockets or their parents having to find another place to live.

It would still mean, worst of all, that 24 million fewer Americans will have health insurance.

All those things stay the same. This minor change made by the House at the last minute doesn't change any of those things.

For the same reasons TrumpCare 1 only got the support of 17 percent of the American people, TrumpCare 2 will probably have even less support.

All the while, these cuts end up giving a massive tax break to the wealthiest Americans--those making over $250,000 a year, multimillionaires, billionaires. Even insurance executives who make over $500,000 a year will get a tax break, while middle class and older Americans get the short end of the stick. Here we are telling average Americans they are going to get less coverage, they are going to pay more, so we can give the multimillionaires a huge tax break. Who would be for that?

As more and more Americans find out, the vote over there is going to be much less popular even than it is today, and it is very unpopular today, with only 17 percent of Americans liking the bill. It is hard to get lower than that, but I think, as people learn more about this bill, it will get even lower.

The House Republicans have added an amendment that makes the bill even more cruel. It would allow States to opt out of the requirement to cover folks with preexisting conditions for the services they need. God forbid you have a preexisting condition and live in a State that doesn't keep the requirement. Your only option might be a poorly subsidized high-risk pool where you might be forced to wait in line for virtually unaffordable coverage. Remember the death panels scare tactic used against ObamaCare? They didn't actually exist in ObamaCare, but they might in TrumpCare. These high-risk pools, with long lines and unaffordable coverage, are the real death panels.

That same amendment means an insurance company can charge an older American even more than five times the amount they are charged under the base bill. It would take us back to the days when insurance companies could price sick people out of insurance and drive older Americans to bankruptcy by charging outlandish rates. That is what House Republicans did with the bill to win more votes. It is unfathomable.

We don't even know how large the negative impact of these changes will be because we don't have a CBO score. Does anyone imagine this amendment will result in even more Americans being insured? Does anyone imagine it will provide better coverage for Americans with preexisting conditions? I don't think so.

That explains why Republican colleagues in the House are rushing it through with hardly any debate, no hearings, and no CBO score. They don't want the American people to see this bill. The leaders of the House were panicked that if they didn't pass the bill today, their Members would go home for 2 weeks--they are on recess over in the House--get beaten up by their constituents who hate this bill, and they would back off.

Only 17 percent of Americans approved of TrumpCare. The rest of them packed townhall meetings and public forums to demand that their House Members reject it. They wrote and called, emailed, and contacted Members on social media. Those were the voices of average Americans who stopped the first TrumpCare proposal from even receiving a vote.

Now Republicans are trying to sneak through their second, even worse version of TrumpCare without debate or any analysis of what it would mean for our country. Maybe it raises costs on working Americans even more. Maybe it doubles the amount of uninsured Americans. The House won't know before voting on the bill.

I sincerely hope that if this bill passes--I pray it doesn't--the Senate won't mimic the House and try to rush a bill through without hearings or debate or analysis.

Mr. President, regardless of the process, TrumpCare is a breathtakingly irresponsible piece of legislation that would endanger the health of tens of millions of Americans and break the bank for millions more. I don't know what my friends in the House would say to their constituents if they vote for this bill.

What would you say to a 56-year-old in your district, who is already struggling to balance the cost of medicine and rent and groceries, when she has to pay more than five times as much in healthcare as someone who is 35 and healthy?

What would you say to the mother in your district whose daughter has cancer and who is worried that if she ever lapses in coverage, the insurance company can raise the rates so high on her family that she couldn't afford to get health insurance for her daughter and would have to watch her suffer? The agony a parent would go through. What do you say to that mother?

I don't know how any of my Republican colleagues here in the Senate when we get this bill and now in the House can explain why they voted to rip away people's healthcare.

If there were a Hippocratic Oath for Congress, ``Do no harm,'' TrumpCare would never come up for a vote. It harms the American people in so many ways. It doesn't have to be this way. Republicans could drop these efforts for repeal, drop these attempts that are undermining our healthcare system and causing insurers to flee the marketplace, and come work with Democrats on improving the healthcare system. Our door is open.

So I would just make one final plea to my Republican friends in the House. I know they rarely listen to Senate leaders, especially Democratic ones, but this is an issue where so much is at stake that I hope they forget party labels at the moment. I ask them to do what representatives should do, something very simple: Think about your

constituents. Consult your conscience before you vote for this bill.

I believe if they truly do and consider what every independent expert and medical association is saying about this bill and what it would mean for our healthcare system, they will come to the right conclusion and vote no today.

On one final issue, Mr. President, I see my friend from Florida about to take the floor. I would like to yield to him for a moment, but before I do, I would like to recognize his outstanding efforts in securing additional funding in the appropriations bill for NASA.

NASA had actually been targeted for certain cuts by the Trump administration in their budget that would nix the program to send a mission to Europa, a Moon of Jupiter. Thanks to the advocacy of Senator Nelson, NASA will get an overall increase of $368 million in the appropriations bill--enough to fund that mission.

I know this issue is near and dear to Bill's heart. As a young Congressman, he was the second sitting Member of Congress and the first Member in the House to serve on a NASA mission, aboard the space shuttle Columbia. He has a passion for and a deep knowledge of our space program. There is no one in the Senate who has done more for it than Bill Nelson. He has worked hard ever since he got to the Senate, and he has had great success.

Once again, he has had a success here today. His constituents in Florida and all Americans should be grateful that Bill is a real leader on both of these issues in our caucus and in the whole Senate.

I yield to my friend, the Senator from Florida.

I announce that the Senator from Illinois (Mr. Durbin) is necessarily absent.