Floor Statements

Mr. President, I want to thank my colleagues from Colorado and Alabama for a very interesting and robust debate, but I would like to change the subject slightly.

Germany

Mr. President, Germany and America are dear friends, and friends tell each other the truth.

On the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that Germany plans to continue supporting Ukraine ``as strongly and as long [as possible and] as necessary.''

I regret to observe that based on where we are today, that would certainly be a change of pace. By all measures, Germany's so-called strong support is more lamb than lion. The numbers don't lie. Germany's current spending to help Ukraine by share of gross domestic product--if you compare the spending of one country to another, it is not fair to use raw numbers because some countries are wealthier than others. So if you look at the current spending by our friends in Germany to help Ukraine, by share of gross domestic product, Germany wouldn't even be in the top 10 nations in terms of financial support for Ukraine. And those are just the numbers.

Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and the United Kingdom have all outspent Germany by share of gross domestic product. Our neighbors in Canada have outspent Germany, too, both in raw dollars and by share of GDP. And the same is certainly true of the American people. The American people have spent roughly double--double--what our friends in Germany have spent in Ukraine, fighting for freedom, by share of domestic gross product.

With an entire ocean and most of Europe between America and Ukraine, Americans are wondering why the United States and Canada have dug deeper to deter Russian aggression than Germany has. That is a fair question.

Germany, as we all know--and I am very proud of them for this--is the economic leader of Europe. Germany has the fourth largest economy in the world. Germany has the fourth largest economy in the world. But the fact is--friends tell friends the truth--that Germany is failing to pull its weight in Ukraine. And if we look back on the past year, it is very clear that Germany's support of Ukraine has been heavy on words and short on action. And I hate to have to say that.

Somehow, Germany's leadership has lost the urgency it had when Putin began his march into Ukraine. At that time, if we think back a year, Germany could not have been in a more vulnerable position. The Bundeswehr, Germany's armed forces, were dilapidated.

At the end of the Cold War, Germany had nearly 500,000 soldiers. Roughly 3 percent of its spending by GDP was allocated to Germany's defense. When Putin invaded Ukraine, Germany's military was roughly one-third of that size, about 183,000 soldiers, and spending on defense by our friends in Germany had plummeted to 1.3 percent of gross domestic product.

Its airplanes couldn't fly. Its tanks were unusable. Its bloated military bureaucracy appeared to be the only thing the German Government properly maintained.

Were it not for the United States of America, Putin would be in Paris. But we stepped up, and so did others. God bless them.

It wasn't just Germany's armed forces that were unprepared for Putin's invasion. Germany's energy grid relied on Russian natural gas, as we both know, Mr. President. For several decades--this goes back many years--Germany became increasingly reliant on Russia's energy. Germany appeared to believe, foolishly--``naively,'' maybe, is a better word--that its energy trade with Putin would yield friendship. Instead, it yielded dependency.

In this trade, these weren't some cupcakes that friends were exchanging as neighbors. What we are talking about here is the very security and dependability of the fourth largest economy in the history of the world--or, rather, in the current history of the world--and its power grid. Germany placed its power grid in Russia's hands, and Putin knew that. Putin knew that Germany's energy dependency would make it a lot easier for him to march into Ukraine, not harder. Everybody knew it.

Now, with winter coming, I want to give our friends in Germany a lot of credit. Germany did have some urgency in correcting its energy. Germany built LNG terminals to expand its gas reserves. The United States sold energy to our friends in Germany. We were happy to do it.

Germany expanded its renewable energy efforts. It still has not embraced nuclear energy, as I hope it will, but Germany did expand its renewable energy efforts. It has now as a goal reaching 80 percent renewable by 2030, and that is good.

But there is just one problem. Even that effort could leave Germany exposed to reliance on an adversary because, according to a report from the International Energy Agency, China is on track to be responsible for 95 percent of the global production of solar panels. China currently makes up 80 percent of the world's supply. If it is not careful, Germany may realize the new boss is the same as the old boss.

But that same urgency that our friends in Germany showed to address the power grid is nowhere to be found on the military front--nowhere.

In the wake of Putin's rapid invasion, Chancellor Scholz made big promises. He called it a turning point in German history. He said defense spending is going to increase to 2 percent. He said he was going to create an extra military fund valued at $107 billion. He said his military was going to increase by 30,000 women and men by 2025. I regret that Germany's urgency seems to have disappeared.

Military spending has barely nudged above 1.5 percent, still short of the 2

percent commitment that Germany made to NATO.

Germany did purchase 35 American F-35 fighter jets. Do you know when they are going to be ready? 2027.

Experts much smarter than me doubt that Germany will reach its 30,000 promised new troops by the date that it said it would.

The truth is--the cold, hard, unvarnished truth--since the invasion began, Germany has been slow to provide weapons to Ukraine. Friends tell friends the truth. Germany only agreed to send its Leopard 2 tanks after weeks of haggling with President Biden, during which Chancellor Scholz refused to send the tanks--his own tanks--unless the United States also committed to sending its M1 Abrams, after all we had done and will continue to do. Even when offering up so little, the German Chancellor demanded the United States of America do more.

One year ago, as Putin's invasion commenced, Chancellor Scholz vowed to ``invest much more in the security of our country'' and ``guarantee a secure energy supply.''

On the energy front, Putin turned off the gas, and our friends in Germany, demonstrating extraordinary ingenuity, managed to pivot. But on the defense front, Germany has failed to show any serious steps to grow its military. The fourth largest economy in the world has fallen short in its support for Ukraine.

Promises to recruit more troops, spend more money, and reinvigorate its Bundeswehr--they are nice, but those are only words. Germany seems to acknowledge that the barbarians are at the gate. I don't know how it could be any clearer. So why aren't our friends in Germany willing to act? I just don't understand it.

In every way--in every way--Putin poses a larger threat to Germany than he does to the United States. That is saying a lot because Putin poses a threat to the United States. But he is a much larger threat to our friends in Germany. Yet the United States of America, the people of this country, have outspent Germany sevenfold in helping our friends in Ukraine. It is not right.

Mr. President, you and I both know that what you do--not what you say, what you do--is what you believe, and everything else is just cottage cheese.

Talk is cheap, and, in this case, it is literally cheaper than funding the Bundeswehr. But Germany's natural gas was also cheap, and that didn't end very well.

If Germany wants to be a leader in Europe--and, gosh, I hope they do--it needs to lead. That starts with footing the bill for its own defense--we are willing to share that burden, but the American people can't do it alone--and it starts with helping Ukraine.

We have wasted a year. It is long past time for our friends in Germany to step up and meet the defense promises it made when Putin invaded.

I end as I began: Germany and America are dear, dear friends, and friends tell friends the truth.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, a leading philosopher of the last century--his name was Jean-Paul Sartre--famously once said that ``existence precedes essence.'' In other words, Sartre's words, not mine: To be is to act.

In other words, my words, not Mr. Sartre's. In other words: What you do is what you believe. What you do is what you believe, not what you say. What you do is what you believe, and everything else is just cottage cheese.

I think that is particularly relevant to our government in Washington, DC, and indeed to probably all forms of government in America. We are what we do, not what we say.

As the Presiding Officer knows, we are in negotiations with respect to the debt limit. I, for one--and I think almost all, if not all, of my colleagues in the Senate will agree with me on this. We will not default on America's debt. We will not. But in conjunction with addressing that issue of the debt limit, many of our colleagues in the House and many of our colleagues here in the Senate would like to talk to President Biden about what we can do as a Congress and as a President to keep us from getting in this situation again, where we have to so radically raise the debt limit.

In other words, the request to the President is: Mr. President, let's sit down and talk about how we can slow the rate of growth in our spending and slow the rate of growth in our debt accumulation, for a variety of reasons, not only pertaining to the debt limit but also pertaining to trying to get control of the budget. And I hope the President will accept that invitation.

In those negotiations, the President has said--incorrectly, in my judgment--but he has said repeatedly, as have some of my Democratic friends, that, well, all the Republicans want to do--all the Republicans want to do in these negotiations is hurt Medicare and hurt Social Security.

Now, I understand politics. We both do. We have been doing this for a long time, and politically I understand why the President and some of my colleagues are saying that. It is not true,

of course. And I don't think it is beneficial to these negotiations. But the fact that the President is saying this and saying, well, you Republicans want to hurt Medicare, for example, I find to be quite ironic--extraordinarily ironic--maybe even a tad hypocritical.

In Washington, DC, you have to watch what people do, not what they say.

In the waning days of the last Congress--once again, watching what people do, not what they say--President Biden, who has accused Members of my party of wanting to hurt Medicare, tried to cut Medicare himself.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services--CMS, as we call it, as you know--every year proposes what is called a physician's fee schedule for doctors who treat Medicare patients. If you are a doctor and you have a Medicare patient, you don't get to send the Federal Government a bill for whatever you think your services are worth. That is not the way it works.

Medicare, every year, through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services--CMS--every year proposes a physician fee schedule. They tell the physicians that this is what you can charge and not a penny more.

President Biden's CMS, last year, proposed to cut all physician payments, all provider payments by 4.5 percent. He didn't want to lift up Medicare; he wanted to cut it--not Republicans, the President.

Now, why is that important?

Well, a lot of physicians won't take Medicare anymore because they say--and they won't take Medicaid either, for that matter. They say: We just can't. We can't turn a profit. We are not looking to make, say the physicians, obscene profits, but we are in the middle of inflation. Healthcare inflation is as real as anything else. We are paying more in rent. We are paying more for our nurses. We are paying more for supplies. And the Medicare fees that we are paying to treat folks on Medicaid and Medicare, they are not keeping up. They are just not.

And so here comes President Biden, through his Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, CMS--here comes President Biden, the champion of Medicare, he proposed a 4.5-percent across-the-board cut for every physician treating Medicare in America. That is 900,000 people in my State.

So I am sitting there listening to this, hearing the President say: All the Republicans want to do is hurt Medicare, on the left hand, but on the right hand he is trying to cut all the physicians and other providers in the program--we have 900,000 people in my State in the program--by 4.5 percent in the middle of rising inflation. I just found that extraordinary. Watch what people do, not what they say.

So I introduced a bill. The name of my bill was Protecting Medicare Patients and Physicians Act. It would have eliminated--it would have eliminated that 4- to 4.5-percent cut that President Biden wanted to impose on Medicare doctors. I came to the body of this Senate to present that bill. And I didn't come to my colleagues with a problem; I came with a solution. I wasn't going to say: Well, let's just don't cut Medicare doctors and eliminate the cut. I said let's do eliminate the cut, but I have a way to pay for it. I am not suggesting that we reject President Biden's attempt to cut Medicare and fill the hole by borrowing the money. I said, I have got a solution.

I found $9.8 billion sitting in a fund at the Department of Health and Human Services. It was $9.8 billion when I was able to get the data. I suspect at one point it got as high as $15 billion. It was called the Provider Relief Fund. As the President knows, this Congress appropriated lots of money to our healthcare providers to help them deal with COVID, and not all of the money, thankfully, was needed. Many of the healthcare providers returned some of the money. And at the time I presented the bill, there was $9.8 billion that had been returned and was sitting in an account at the Department of Health and Human Services--way more than enough--way more than enough to prevent a 4- percent and, in some cases, a 4-percent-plus cut to Medicare that President Biden proposed.

I went to every one of my Republican colleagues in the Senate. They all said: We are with you, Kennedy. Let's do it.

So I came to this floor. I came to this floor to ask for unanimous consent, and that, as you know, is where you present a bill, and if nobody objects, it is passed.

But there was an objection, and it came from a good friend and a good man, Senator Ron Wyden, who is chairman of our Finance Committee.

There aren't words in English to express how much I respect Ron Wyden. But Senator Wyden came to the floor and said: Kennedy, I am going to object to your bill. He said: I don't want you to worry about this. We are aware that President Biden has proposed to cut every Medicare physician in America, but we are not going to let him do that. We are putting together a budget bill right now. We call it the omnibus. We are putting together a budget bill right now that is going to address that problem, and that is why I am objecting to your bill. Your bill, Kennedy, is unnecessary.

Now, I am not blaming this on Chairman Wyden. I am not. The omnibus passed with a vote of, I think, virtually all, if not all, of my Democratic colleagues and with some Republican colleagues. So I am not saying it is Senator Wyden's fault. But, after the omnibus passed--I didn't vote for it, in part, because I didn't know what was in it. But, after the omnibus passed, I went back and looked, and lo and behold, the omnibus bill, which passed at the encouragement of President Biden and with a lot more votes from my Democratic friends than my Republican colleagues, had a 2-percent cut for every provider, every physician, who treats a Medicare patient in America--a 2-percent cut. That is better than a 4-percent cut, but it is still a cut at a time of raging inflation.

Now, I don't know yet what that impact is going to be on healthcare and the healthcare delivery system in my State. I don't know how many more physicians--after President Biden has cut their fees, I don't know how many more physicians are going to stand up and say: I can't take Medicare patients anymore.

I hope none, but I suspect some.

Oh, and let me mention this. I talked about that pool of money, the provider relief fund, that had $9.8 billion in it--maybe $15 billion-- sitting there in an account, unspent, unappropriated. What happened to it? I don't know. It got spent on something, but it didn't get spent on helping Medicare doctors and patients. They got cut 2 percent.

So I am going to end like I began. In this town, you have to watch what people do, not what they say. The President can try to blame the Republicans and say: Well, they don't want to seriously negotiate about controlling spending and controlling debt. All they want to do is cut Medicare.

He already did it. He did it in December.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, Louisiana, like all of our States, is working as hard as we can to improve K-12, elementary and secondary education. We used to have the best system of elementary and secondary education in the world. We still have the best system of higher education in the world, bar none. Kids from all over our planet want to come to America to go to college.

I know our universities have problems. We have to do a better job, in my judgment, with encouraging our universities to allow the free exchange of ideas, the dialectic through which we get the truth. I will save that topic for another day.

Our problem in America is elementary and secondary education. It is frustrating. We made some improvements, but not nearly enough. It is frustrating. Americans can do extraordinary things. Americans can unravel the human genome. Americans can take a diseased human heart and replace it with a new one and make the thing beat. Americans can send a person to the Moon and bring that person back safely. But we can't seem to teach all of our kids how to read and write and do basic math when we have 18 years to do it. I know the Presiding Officer knows what I am talking about because you, in a prior lifetime, have been in the trenches. Yes, we made progress, but it is so, so frustrating sometimes.

We have made progress. I know in Colorado, in part under your leadership--in large part under your leadership--Colorado has made strides. We made strides in Louisiana. We started--we have made efforts to improve for many, many years, but we started in earnest under a Governor in Louisiana called Governor Buddy Roemer, back in the late eighties, early nineties. I am not saying other Governors before and after Buddy didn't contribute mightily, but Buddy made education a major goal of his administration. And we have made progress, but it is fits and it is starts.

Here is our problem today. Some years ago, we started grading our schools. We graded our schools in Louisiana, our elementary and secondary school for two reasons. First, because we want education quality and, No. 2, transparency. We want parents to know where their child is going to school. We grade our schools A, B, C, D, E, F, and it is tough because everybody wants to be the best, but that which is measured gets done.

Today, we still grade our schools and we should continue to grade our schools. But here is the problem: Forty-one percent of our elementary and middle schools get As and Bs. I think that is probably pretty accurate. We are going to get that number up, those letter grades up, but about 41 percent of our elementary and middle schools grade ``A'' or ``B.'' Seventy percent of our high schools grade ``A'' or ``B.'' Something is not mentioned here. I wish I could say that 70 percent of our high schools were ``A'' or ``B'' schools, but we all know in Louisiana that they are not. If you look at our college entry scores, if you look at our ACT scores, if you look at other objective assessments, they are not in line with 70 percent of our high schools being ``A'' schools or ``B'' schools, while only 40 percent of our elementary and middle schools are. And that is just a fact. I hope there will come a time in my lifetime when I come here and say we have 90 percent or all of our schools are ``A'' or ``B'' schools, but I can't do that today. I wish I could, but I can't.

We need to look reality in the eye and accept it--not like we do in Washington, look reality in the eye and deny it. In Louisiana, we believe in looking reality in the eye and accept it. I know it is hard.

Right now, our teachers and our principals and our superintendents and our legislatures and people of Louisiana who care about education are trying to reform the system and come up with a new methodology, an objective methodology that properly grades our high schools; and it is hard. I know. I get it.

Here is the undercurrent. A lot of our teachers and our principals and our school board members are concerned that if the grades go down to reflect reality, they are going to get blamed. They are going to get blamed, and I get it. And it is wrong to blame them.

I will just mention our teachers. You know, for a kid to learn, somebody has to make him do his homework. Teachers can't do that. For a kid to learn, someone has to make that child go to bed at night and get a full night's sleep. For a kid to learn, someone has to feed that kid breakfast in the morning. For a kid to learn, someone at home has to enforce and reinforce to that child that he or she has to mind his teachers. It is called ``parents.''

In Louisiana, as in other States and as throughout the world, unfortunately, we have some parents who don't seem to care. I don't know what to do about that. I don't know why it is, but we do. And we can't expect teachers and superintendents and school board members to take the place of parents, but too often, they are blamed for all of the problems when, really, it starts with the parents. And the fact of the matter is, if a parent--if a parent doesn't love his kid--I can't imagine that, but it happens--if a parent doesn't love his kid, the kid is not going to stop loving his parent; the kid is going to stop loving himself. So I get it. We can't hold our teachers and our superintendents and our school board members responsible for fixing the impossible. We just have to figure out a way to work around it.

It is not just money. The Federal Government, State government, local government last year spent somewhere in the range of $760 billion-- three-quarters of a trillion dollars--on elementary and secondary education. In Louisiana, we spent about $12,000 per year, per child. That is a lot of money in my State, given the standard in cost of living. By way of comparison, Florida spends about $10,000. It is not just money. I read a statistic one time--it is several years old. I don't know if it is accurate today or not. But I read several years ago that we spend twice as much--we, in America--spend about twice as much on elementary and secondary education as Slovakia does, yet we rank about the same. I don't know if it is still accurate, but it was then. It is not just money. It is also will. It is commitment.

I want to emphasize one more time that we need to come up with a new system that doesn't just blame the teachers and the superintendents and the school board members. I don't blame them for not wanting to be the scapegoats. About--I don't know--it was 2002, 2003, I was State treasurer. One day, I was listening in on a legislative hearing, listening to all these experts testify about how we fix these schools. There was not a teacher among them. I remember thinking, you know, I wonder how many of these folks really know what public schools are like today. So I went back to my office, and I made a phone call to these Baton Rouge Parish School systems where our State capital is located, and I said: What does it take to be a substitute teacher? They said, man, we need substitutes. All you have to do is have a college degree and go to a short orientation. We need substitutes so bad, we will take politicians. I said: Sign me up.

Every year since then, I try to do it three times a year. Sometimes I try to do it more. I have done it less this year. I will make it up this spring. I have been a volunteer substitute teacher. Every time, I insisted I really want

to be the substitute. I don't want somebody there with me. I don't want to just go and talk about how a bill becomes law. I want to be a substitute. If you do it--I encourage everybody to do it--you start about, I don't know, depending on the school, quarter to 7 and go to 2:45, maybe 3, 3:30. You have lunchroom duty or bus duty.

Let me tell you something. You are worn out. The first time I did it--I will never do this again. They gave me 11th grade chemistry. After about 2 hours--nobody told me this, I realized, man, you have got to go to the bathroom before you start class.

The next time I taught, I remember I brought a thermos of coffee because you get so tired. But my point is, after starting--I think then, we started at 8 and I went to 2:45. My plan was to go home after substitute teaching this chemistry class--my plan was to go to my office at the State Capitol there and work. I went home. I was dead- dog, down-to-the-marrow tired. It is hard being a teacher. It is hard. We have done a better job in Louisiana, with our teachers' cooperation, finding out which of our teachers can teach and paying them. And we also worked hard to find out which of our teachers can't teach and either teach them how or find a new line of work. I am not going to stand here and blame the teachers.

But I return to where I began. Seventy percent of our schools are not ``A'' and ``B'' schools. I wish they were. Some day they will be, but they are not. All I am asking today to my people back home who are listening, to the people in Louisiana who care about education--and most of them do--to our teachers, to our principals, to our superintendents, to our school board members, to our board of elementary and secondary members, to our legislators: Let's work together. Let's look reality in the eye and accept it. Let's understand that we need a new methodology to try to grade our schools. Let's look reality in the eye and accept the fact that our parents deserve to know the quality of school that their kids are attending, and let's come up with a new system that is accurate but that is fair to everybody. Let's stop blaming people and regretting yesterday and start creating tomorrow.

Because in my State--and I bet it is true in the Presiding Officer's State--the future of my State is education. It is not the price of oil, it is not the unemployment rate, it is not who the Senators are. It is education.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I want to talk a few minutes about Medicare.

If I am on Medicare and I go to my physician for an earache and my physician treats me, hopefully successfully, my physician then does not turn around and send a bill to Medicare that says: For services rendered for an earache. What my physician does is fill out a form that has a bunch of codes on it, and my physician fills out the form with the code for an earache.

Now, what does that mean? That means that when that form with a code for an earache goes to Washington, the administrators at Medicare look up the code for an earache, and they know then how much they are going to pay my physician for treating an earache.

As you can imagine, there are thousands of codes--literally thousands of codes--because there are thousands of diagnoses for which our citizens on Medicare seek treatment every year.

So, every year, Medicare puts out a fee schedule, and in its essential form this is just a schedule listing all of the codes for all the different illnesses that doctors who treat Medicare patients bill for. And these codes, this fee schedule, are used to reimburse doctors and hospitals. Well, of course, it is not as simple as that, and the way that the codes are put together and the fee schedule is put together are not exactly a model of clarity. And we need to do better, and, hopefully, someday we will do better. But, at the moment, we have to deal with reality as it is.

Now, in setting a code--or how much Medicare is going to pay my doctor for treating my earache under Medicare--and in putting together the fee schedule, which is put together by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which I will just refer to it as ``Medicare''-- Medicare takes all kinds of factors into consideration in deciding how much to pay my doctor for an earache. Medicare looks at things like the diagnosis, of course. Medicare will pay less for an earache than for heart surgery. Medicare looks at the procedure that the doctor had to use.

Medicare looks at the location. If I go to my doctor in Baton Rouge, where my primary care physician is located, the cost of living in Baton Rouge is lower than the cost of living in New York. So the fee for an earache paid by Medicare to my Baton Rouge physician is going to be lower than that paid to a physician in New York.

The fee schedule looks at time and expenses of the doctor. The fee schedule that Medicare puts together looks at things like the cost of maintaining a practice: rent, supplies, support personnel. The fee schedule tries to take into consideration the cost of medical malpractice.

So the point is that a doctor treating me in Baton Rouge for an earache will not receive the same fee that a doctor, for example, in New York will receive for treating a patient there under Medicare for an earache.

But every year Medicare gets together and they send out a new fee schedule, and it is a very complicated process. And that process is complicated by the fact of what we call budget neutrality. Under current law, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services--or Medicare, as I have been calling it--is required to make budget neutrality adjustments to the payment schedule. And the technical definition is--I will read it to you, and then I will explain it: Medicare is required to make Medicare physician payment schedule adjustments whenever changes in relative value units generate a payment increase or decrease of $200 million.

I told you it was complicated.

Now, what does that mean? That means that Medicare is statutorily required--required by Congress--to maintain budget neutrality, and this means that, as certain codes increase in value, in order to maintain budget neutrality, Medicare has to reduce payment for other codes. Budget neutrality is also

much more complicated than I just explained it, but those are the basic rules.

Now, here is the problem. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services--CMS, or Medicare, as I have been referring to it--has just released their 2023 physician fee schedule. The new fee schedule has come out, and because of the formula and because of the budget neutrality requirement, CMS is proposing--or Medicare--a 4.5-percent across-the-board reduction in Medicare payments. So every payment is going to be cut 4.5 percent across the board.

Well, it gets even more difficult. Due to the $1.9 trillion deficit increase caused by the American Rescue Plan and under our budget rules, pay-go sequestration is going to be triggered by the American Rescue Plan, and that is going to require an additional 4-percent reduction across the board in payments to physicians and hospitals.

So unless we do something, every physician who treats a patient who is on Medicare--it doesn't matter what for--is going to be paid 8.5 percent less--in the middle of raging inflation, in the middle of not only doctor shortages but staff shortages as well.

Now, this is not the first time we have had this problem. We had it last year, and we had it the year before. We solved it then, but we need to solve it today. And you do not have to be a senior at Cal Tech to figure out that if you cut physicians' fees for every different diagnosis for which Americans seek treatment from a Medicare physician by 8.5 percent, physicians are going to have to either make it up somewhere or stop seeing Medicare patients. So all of a sudden your doctor under Medicare is not taking any more Medicare patients. We don't want that.

Not only that, but the Medicare fee schedule is looked to by private insurance companies when they determine how much to pay physicians under their insurance plans. That is the problem.

Here is what my bill would do to solve it. My bill would freeze the current fee schedule in this sense--not per se but indirectly. My bill would keep physician reimbursement at existing levels. So the amount that doctors are paid today for that earache would be the same next year.

My bill would pause the pay-go cuts until 2024. So, in effect, my bill would prevent, next year, an 8.5-percent reduction across the board to physician fees.

Now, I know what you are thinking, Mr. President. You are thinking: Well, I have heard speeches by Kennedy before about controlling the cost of spending in government and the rate of growth. So here he is suggesting that we spend more.

And it is true that this bill would replace the fee schedule cuts by adding money to the Medicare budget. The pay-go cuts would just be postponed. But I have a pay-for. I am not asking this Congress just to add spending and go borrow the money and put us further in debt. I have a way to pay for it.

As you know, we sent--``we,'' meaning the U.S. Congress, sent--a lot of money to our healthcare delivery system during COVID to help patients, or, rather, to help physicians and hospitals deal with our healthcare crisis. We sent a lot of that money through what is called the Provider Relief Fund. These are dollars that were sent out to the hospitals and the doctors to help them get through the COVID pandemic.

Our doctors and hospitals didn't use all that money. They have returned some of it, believe it or not. As of February of this year, a few months ago, they had returned $9.8 billion. And I suspect, by now, they have returned, as best as we can tell from CBO, about $15 billion. So we have $15 billion in our healthcare budget that is not accounted for in terms of how it would be spent.

My bill would cost $2.25 billion. I would propose, Mr. President, that we pay for that $2.25 billion and take it out of what I believe is the $15 billion pot of money that was returned to the Provider Relief Fund. So I have a problem, I have a solution, and I have a way to pay for it without us having to spend money we don't have and thereby borrow it.

So, Mr. President, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Finance be discharged from further consideration of S. 5194.

Let me stop just for a moment, Mr. President. We have to solve this problem. We are going to solve this problem. We solved it last year, and we solved it the year before. Nobody in this body wants to throw people off Medicare.

Now, we are having trouble putting together a budget. I don't know how that movie is going to end. It may end with an omnibus. It may end with a continuing resolution, where we will wait for a new Congress. But we need to solve this problem now and not make it contingent on an omnibus and not make it contingent upon a continuing resolution. We need to solve it now for the American people who depend on Medicare, and that is what my bill does.

We can continue to fight over the budget. We can continue to fight over the CR. But we are going to solve this problem today with a pay- for, with my bill.

So I repeat, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Finance be discharged from further consideration of S. 5194 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration, and I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I appreciate my good friend Senator Wyden's comments. And I hope he gets some sleep off that red-eye flight.

I am just going to repeat quickly what I said before.

I hope we can put together--we can't solve this problem without passing a bill. I don't know if we are going to be able to pass a bill, any kind of bill. Hopefully, before we go home for Christmas and before this Congress ends, we will be able to do the National Defense Authorization Act, which I think we are going to do this week. There will be some people objecting to the NDAA. I know that. And it will slow it down. But after they object and they get to be dramatic for a little while, we will come back and pass the bill. And then we will decide whether to do an omnibus or whether we are going to do a continuing resolution and wait for the new Congress.

But in order to solve this problem, we have got to do something now. And there are millions of Americans out there that are looking at an 8\1/2\ percent cut to Medicare when we have an 8-percent inflation. That is a 16-point swing. And those millions of people are not just physicians or nurses. They are patients who depend on Medicare for life and death.

So I hope that the chairman of Finance, who is whip smart, will consider my proposal. It would postpone the pay-go cuts of 4 percent, and it would freeze the current fee schedule. If we don't, if the new fee schedule goes into effect, we are going to have another 4\1/2\ percent cut--that is where I get the 8\1/2\ percent--and it would pay for it.

It wouldn't increase debt at all. We pay for it, very simply, as I explained. We pay for it out of the $15 billion in the Provider Relief Fund.

And if our Finance Committee doesn't like that as a pay-for, I have another one. You can pay for it out of the Medicare Improvement Fund. It has 7.3 billion in it. Now, that is $24 billion we have got to solve the $2.5 billion problem so the elderly in our country can sleep tonight. So I hope my esteemed colleague will take this into consideration. And I know that he will.

Mr. President, I am going to talk for a minute about another subject: flood insurance. It doesn't do any good to offer flood insurance when people can't afford it. And that is what FEMA is doing right now.

We all know--or most people know--that you can't buy flood insurance really in the private market. I mean, you can, but for the most part, you can't. And if your house floods and you have homeowners insurance, don't make the mistake of thinking your homeowners insurance covers it because it doesn't. You have got to go buy special flood insurance.

And we have had this problem for a while, and the Federal Government addressed it by creating the National Flood Insurance Program. We call it, as you know, NFIP. About 5 million people who wouldn't be insured for flood otherwise are members of the National Flood Insurance Program. They don't get it for free. They pay for the flood insurance, and they pay dearly.

My State, Louisiana, has 5,000 people out of 5 million who depend on the National Flood Insurance Program. We in Louisiana have the highest participation rate in the country, bar none. And despite what some people may think, my people who are buying flood insurance, they are not multimillionaires; they are working people. They are people who get up every day and go to work, and they obey the law and pay their taxes. They try to do the right thing by their children. They live paycheck to paycheck. These aren't multimillionaires paying for this flood insurance. And they are not paying for the flood insurance on mansions on the beach. We don't have those in Louisiana. These are working people.

Now, for my people and for most Americans who carry flood insurance, their home is their biggest investment. It is the biggest investment they will ever make. It is the most money they will ever spend at one time. And so they want to protect their investment. And they need flood insurance to do that. And we in the Federal Government solved the problem when we created the National Flood Insurance Program.

Now, last year, FEMA, which is under the executive branch, of course--we all know what FEMA is--FEMA rolled out the most significant change in history in the way the National Flood Insurance Program calculates the cost of flood insurance--the most important change in history--and they didn't ask Congress for our input. They just did it.

They went out and hired a consultant who created a new algorithm. And this algorithm, supposedly, says FEMA, can see the future. It can look out 35 years and tell whether your home is going to flood and when it is going to flood. And they cannot only look at a particular area, they say this algorithm is so good that it can look at your specific property and tell whether it is going to flood and assess the risk. Man, I want a dozen of those.

FEMA calls this Risk Rating 2.0. There is just one problem: FEMA won't tell any of us in the U.S. Congress, much less the American people, how this algorithm works. I asked them to give me the algorithm, and I would pay, at my expense--at my expense--to have somebody evaluate it. FEMA said, if I showed it to you, Kennedy, I would have to kill you. They won't show it to us.

But yet when I asked them about it--I have asked them in committees-- FEMA says, Risk Rating 2.0--that is what they call it--they say it is fairer, and they say it is based on the value of your home and the unique flood risk for that property. Once again, man, FEMA is clairvoyant. This algorithm is awesome. They can look out 35 years; they just won't tell us how they do it.

There is no transparency on this grading 2.0. People have absolutely no idea, Members of the U.S. Congress have no idea, how this algorithm works and how they come up with the specific price for every home in America. But I will tell you what we do know: All the prices have gone up.

Let me give you an example. In Louisiana, we have a lot of levees. A lot of those levees are helped paid for with Americans' taxpayer money. And we are grateful to our neighbors and America for helping us out. But a lot of those levees are paid for by Louisiana citizens. We have asked: How does this algorithm, in raising these prices, take into account the levees? Are we getting credit for our levees? And they say: Sure. And I say: Can you show me? And they say: If I showed you, I would have to kill you; this is a secret algorithm.

No transparency. None.

Now, in the past, FEMA has already recognized levees and their importance. And they say they are doing it now under Risk Rating 2.0. But they won't show us how. And our levees work. Our levees work.

Last year, we had a number of storms. We had one that came through New Orleans. We have a levee system around New Orleans. It held. Thank you, American taxpayers. But we don't know how FEMA takes that into account. They say they do. They say: Trust us.

You know, every now and then, I play poker with friends. And they are all good friends. I trust them. But you know what, every time I play poker, every hand, I cut the cards. It is not a matter of friendship or trust. That is just the way it is supposed to be: transparency.

Now, this isn't just my opinion. There was an interview in the Times- Picayune, Mr. Dwayne Bourgeois. Mr. Bourgeois knows what he is talking about. He is the executive director of the North Lafourche Conservation, Levee, and Drainage District in Louisiana. He is an expert on floodwater drainage and levees. This is what he said about the Risk Rating 2.0:

I [just] can't figure out why some people get this minimum

result and these other people get the maximum result. I can't

tell you what the secret sauce is to get to that rate.

And the reason he can't is because FEMA will not tell us what the secret sauce is. What is the effect of this secret sauce? FEMA says it is going to make everything fairer. I know this much: It is going to make everything more expensive.

According to FEMA's estimates, 80 percent of the people who have flood

insurance and have to have flood insurance in Louisiana--in part because the mortgage company requires it--are going to see their rates go up.

The likely average full-risk premium for a home in Louisiana under this new secret sauce is $1,700. Under the old system, it was $766. That is a 122-percent increase because of this algorithm, this secret sauce, which FEMA will not let us see.

My people can't afford this. And the reality is, people are already dropping flood insurance. They are saying: We just can't pay for it. Something has to give. We have inflation at 8 percent or my rent has gone up. Food has gone up. Gas has gone up. We just can't afford it.

The number of flood insurance policies in eight of my parishes--we call our counties parishes--in eight of my parishes or counties, the number of policies has dropped from 290,000 in October 2021 to 267,000 in November of 2022, and it has fallen.

So that is 22,000 people--almost 23,000--out of only 8 parishes or counties who have had to give up their flood insurance.

Now, it is not just Louisiana, Mr. President. You may be having the problem in California.

The Associated Press estimates that 1 million fewer Americans will be able to afford to buy flood insurance by the end of the decade because of Risk Rating 2.0, their algorithm, their secret sauce. And E&E News has identified 425,000 policyholders across the country who have already discontinued coverage.

What does that mean for each State? Well, for example, cancellations of flood insurance because they can't afford it. Eleven percent of the people of California who were buying flood insurance can't afford it anymore, they have dropped it; 11 percent of the policyholders in Texas; 9.6 percent in Florida; in Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, and South Carolina, 8 percent.

Now, this is a disaster waiting to happen. And I am all for a fair system, but I will tell you what I am not for. I am not for having a Federal Agency, without consulting the U.S. Congress, without talking to you, Mr. President, about your policyholders in California or me in Louisiana, without explaining to us how they are doing it, just unilaterally raising prices with an algorithm or their secret sauce, as I call it.

Now, Senators Cassidy and Gillibrand and I have introduced a bill. It is called the Flood Insurance Pricing Transparency Act. It is a bipartisan bill. All we are asking that FEMA do is talk to us and tell us how they are coming up with these rate increases.

The American people pay the salary of the people at FEMA, and my people and your people, Mr. President, deserve to know how their policies are being priced.

And, Mr. President--Mr. President Biden, if you are listening--I hope you will pick up the phone and you will call your FEMA Director, for whom I have great respect--I don't hate anybody--but I hope the President will call the FEMA Director here and ask him what planet he just parachuted in from and what is he thinking, raising these kinds of prices without telling the American people why.

Nomination of Dana M. Douglas

Mr. President, I want to talk a few minutes today about inflation, but I don't want to just talk about the problem; I want to talk about the solution as well as Congress's role. I don't need to tell the American people--and I certainly don't need to tell my colleagues--about inflation.

The inflation we are experiencing today is the highest since 1982, and it really is ravaging the American people. It is gutting them like a fish.

Depending upon which experts you believe, the inflation rate right now is about 8 percent. Most Americans will tell you viscerally they feel that it is higher. Every time they go to the grocery store, they feel like prices have gone up 8 percent.

And I don't really want to debate or discuss the causes too much.

There are basically two types of inflation. There is what is called demand-pull inflation and cost-push inflation.

Inflation is just basically too much money chasing too few goods. If you restrict the supply of the goods, that is called cost-push inflation. If you keep the supply of the goods constant and raise demand for the goods, that is called demand-pull inflation.

And the truth is, our current inflation is a direct product of both cost-push and demand-pull.

I do think--well, I know that the U.S. Congress had to spend more money than we would have liked to deal with the pandemic, but I also believe that once the pandemic was over and the economy was recovering, we kept on spending and all of that spending was stimulatory or stimulative and all of that spending did add to inflation. Once again, too much money chasing too few goods.

Since the 1950s, we have had roughly 10 periods of inflation--some very high inflation, some more moderate--but 10 inflationary periods, if you will, in which government decided we need to reduce the rise in prices. We need to reduce inflation.

Most people remember the inflationary period of the 1980s--I know you do, Mr. President--but there have been 10 inflationary periods. And normally what we do to deal with inflation--we talk about Federal Reserve. And we know the Federal Reserve, to get prices down, raises interest rates.

Well, why does the Federal Reserve do that?

It does that to slow the economy.

Well, what does that mean? How do you measure slowing the economy?

Well, here is the dirty little secret that we all don't talk about much: When the Federal Reserve raises interest rates to slow the economy, I will tell you how they measure it, they measure it in jobs, and they measure it in the unemployment rate.

And, in effect--I am not being critical of them. The Federal Reserve is doing its job. But what the Federal Reserve does when it raises interest rates to slow the economy, they are trying to throw people out of work. They are trying to throw people out of work.

Now, I made a few notes. Right now, the unemployment rate is about 3.7 percent. And if you go back in these 10 periods of inflation since the 1950s and look at how many people the Federal Reserve had to put out of work in order to get the inflation down, here is what you see: On average, during those 10 periods, to get inflation down 2 percent, we had to see a rise in unemployment of 3.6 percent.

Now, what does that mean?

Today, unemployment is about 3.7 percent. Inflation is--let's call it 8 percent. Historically--I am not saying it will be the case this time, but historically that would mean that the Federal Reserve, in order to reduce inflation by 2 percent, would have to raise unemployment to 7.3 percent.

And those aren't just a bunch of sterile statistics on a page. Those are 6 million jobs that will be lost, people out of work.

We have some really smart economists who have looked at this problem--Jason Furman, for example, Larry Summers. They both happen to be smart economists who served President Obama. They are suggesting that in order to get this high inflation down, if we just depend on the Federal Reserve alone, that we will have to have an unemployment rate of between 7.5 and 10 percent for a pretty long period of time.

That is anywhere from 8 to 10 million Americans out of work, and that is a lot of pain.

Now, what can Congress do to help?

If you look at the worst of those 10 periods of inflation, most people--I do--think of the 1980s, and most people consider Paul Volcker to be a hero because the then-Federal Reserve Chairman got inflation down.

And a lot of people think that the Chairman of the Federal Reserve then did it all by himself by raising interest rates so high, causing unemployment to go up so high, causing a lot of pain.

He didn't do it alone. Congress helped him. When the Reagan administration came in, the Reagan administration--first thing it did, it cut taxes, which was inflationary--no question--but then the Reagan administration and the U.S. Congress worked with the Federal Reserve whereby the Federal Reserve would raise interest rates, but Congress tried to slow the growth in spending, not cut spending in the sense of our budget this year will be less than last year, just slowing the growth in spending and slowing debt accumulation. And that is how we conquered, other than now, the worst inflationary period in the United States. It wasn't just the Federal Reserve; Congress did its part.

We have to slow the rate of growth in our budget, and we have to slow the accumulation of debt. Now, one might say: Well, you know, Congress doesn't have to do anything; the United States Senate can do what it wants. And that is true. That is true. But if we don't, if we don't slow the rate of growth in our spending, if we don't slow the accumulation of debt, that is going to cause the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates even higher to slow the economy, to raise the unemployment rate, to throw people out of work.

All I am saying is, we all hate inflation. Nobody wants this inflation. And we can debate until the cows come home about what caused it, OK? Was it supply chain? Is it Ukraine? Is it Putin? I happen to think a big part of it is demand-fueled inflation, and we just spent too much money once the

pandemic was over. But I know many of my Democratic friends disagree with me, but they can't--they shouldn't disagree with me on this: We need to do our part to help the Federal Reserve because the Federal Reserve is not raising interest rates just to raise rates; it is raising interest rates, which is its job, to throw people out of work. If it has to raise interest rates to 10 or 12 percent and keep them there, we are going to have 10-plus million Americans out of work. And do you know what is worse than not having enough money to pay for what you need? Not having any money. Losing your job.

Congress can help, but it is going to require help from both sides, both Democrats and Republicans. We are going to have to agree to spend less money. We just are. And I know we have needs, and I am not saying cut the budget in half, but we have to reduce the rate of growth in our spending, and we have to reduce the rate of accumulation in our debt. Even then, we won't be able to avoid all the pain of inflation, but we will be able to save, I predict, millions and millions of jobs we would otherwise lose to these high interest rates.

I know not all my colleagues agree with me. They don't. I have Republican colleagues--I know there are some of my Democrat friends, but I have some Republican colleagues who think that how much we spend makes no difference. They think it makes absolutely no difference. With all the respect I can muster, they are wrong. All you have to do is look at history, and the only way we conquered inflation the last time it was this bad in the 1980s was through cooperation of the Federal Reserve doing its job on the monetary side but also this Congress doing its job on the fiscal side.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 5387 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, on March 31 of this year, my two friends Senator Joe Manchin and Senator Mark Kelly wrote to President Biden:

We are writing to urge you to develop and implement a new

5-year program for oil and gas production in the Gulf of

Mexico without delay.

My amendment would fulfill that request and make it a congressional directive.

Mr. President, do I have any time left?

Mr. President, all my amendment does is to take Senator Manchin's letter and Senator Kelly's letter--well-written, well- reasoned--and make it a congressional directive. That is all it does.

Vote on Amendment No. 5387

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 5385 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, my amendment, which I also offer on behalf of many of my Republican colleagues, would substantially and dramatically lower the cost of insulin for millions of Americans.

As you know, we have 1,403 federally qualified healthcare centers in America, sometimes called community health centers. They have 16,000 sites of service.

My amendment would reimplement a rule that President Biden repealed. My amendment would make insulin available at federally qualified health centers for pennies on the dollar, and it would pay for itself by redirecting existing money from the ObamaCare Public Health and Prevention Fund.

Do I have any time left?

Thank you.

Vote on Amendment No. 5385

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, with me today is Mr. Wesley Davis, one of my able aides in my office. I would like to talk for a few minutes about crime.

It is up. It is way up. The largest city in my State is New Orleans, and New Orleans is on track to becoming the murder capital of the world. In my State and in my city of New Orleans, we have seen a 136- percent rise in homicides, a 101-percent rise in shootings, and a 194- percent rise in carjackings. And this is not just a Louisiana and a New Orleans problem.

Baton Rouge, LA--Baton Rouge, of course, is my capital city--and Shreveport are not much better. And violent crime is also on the rise in major cities from the west coast to the east coast.

We hear a lot about Chicago, of course, and New York City, but from May of 2021 to May of 2022, crime was up 23 percent in Seattle. It was up 21 percent in Washington, DC.

And I would respectfully suggest this is no coincidence. For almost 2 years now--2 years, long time--some people in positions of authority in our country have been calling to defund the police, to dismantle the police. And they have been disrespecting the police.

Many of our public officials--not all of them, but some happen to be mayors in major cities--they believe that cops are a bigger problem than criminals. They do.

They believe that when a cop shoots a criminal, it is automatically the cop's fault. When a criminal shoots a cop, it is the gun's fault. And we also have prosecutors, district attorneys--not all of them but too many of them who live by the motto: Hear no evil, see no evil, and prosecute no evil. And we can now see the result of that attitude.

It is an anti-law enforcement attitude. Now, look, I know cops aren't perfect. I get it. Some of our police officers get out of line intentionally. And when they do, they should be punished. But do you know when a radical jihadist who happens to be a Muslim blows up a school full of school children, we are told don't blame all Muslims because of the acts of a few.

And, gosh, I agree with that, and I know the Presiding Officer does too. How come the same rule doesn't apply to cops? I don't understand. This anti-law enforcement sentiment, understandably, has resulted in lower morale among cops. Duh. It has led to massive resignations. It has led to massive early retirements.

It has in my State, and it has in most other States. It turns out that when you spend years vilifying police officers and making it harder for them to do their job, some of them no longer want to stay. That is not surprising.

In the city of New Orleans, we have fewer than 1,000 police officers. We need 2,000. This year alone, more than 100 police officers have already quit. That is around the same number of police officers who resigned, retired, or were fired in 2020. And these statistics are nationwide; it is not just New Orleans.

The Dallas Police Department is down 550 law enforcement officials. In Portland, OR, the department is looking to fill more than 100 positions for cops.

A headline from last week said:

As officers leave in droves, New Orleans PD's response

times soar to 2.5 hours.

That is not the way our country should work.

Now, you can talk about defunding the police all day, and I don't want to paint with too broad a brush here--not everyone does. But too many people do.

But the reality is that defunding the police results in delayed responses to 9-1-1 phone calls. It demoralizes cops. It causes a lack of good recruits, and it causes our communities to be less safe.

I don't know why this is--if I make it to Heaven, I am going to ask-- but there is some people in our society--not just in America but throughout the world--these people are not sick; they are not mixed up; they are not confused. It is not that their mother or their father did not love them enough. They are just antisocial.

I don't know why, but they are. And they hurt other people. And they steal other people's stuff. And they can't live in society. And to protect us from them, we have to have law enforcement. It is just that simple.

So here is, in my opinion, what we do, because it is hard not to notice that what we are doing right now is not working. I don't mean to be cruel, but a lot of Americans look around at the people who are disrespecting and defunding the police--or trying to--and the attitude of those Americans is, look, don't bother to send in the clowns; they are already here.

The American people want and deserve better. What should we do? No. 1, we have to empower our cops. And when they make a mistake intentionally, when they intentionally violate their oath, they should be punished. But that is a small minority of our law enforcement officials. So we need to empower our cops.

As I said, we have too many people in positions of authority who really think cops are a bigger problem than criminals. We have to pay our cops. We have got to hire more of them. We have got to stand behind them.

When they make a split-second decision, they shouldn't be thinking, Oh, my God, I might lose my family and my home and my job. When they act in good faith and they have to make a split-second decision, we have to stand behind them. And we have to tell our police officers to enforce all laws--not just the big ones, the little ones. And we have to get rid of the ``hear no evil, see no evil, prosecute no evil'' prosecutors.

It is also important that we ask ourselves another question: Why is it that so many young offenders--especially in our inner cities--why is it that so many of these young criminals are more likely to grow up and go to prison than own a home or get married? Why is that?

Because that is true, and that is an embarrassment. And I will give you one reason: Because their schools suck. They do. Too many of our schools are failure factories. We need to fix them. We need to find out which of our teachers can teach and pay them. We need to find out which of our teachers can't teach and either teach them how or tell them to find a new line of work.

I can't recite to you the first six Presidents of the United States in proper order, but I will never forget, ever, my first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grade teachers. Teachers matter. We need to have no-excuses schools. I believe every child can learn; I do. It is tougher for some than others, but I believe that every child can learn.

And I think we need a new rule: I don't care how old you are--I don't care--you are not going to get out of the third grade until you can read and write. No exceptions. None.

And also, I think we have to give our public schools some competition. We need more charter schools. We need more school choice. We need to empower our parents. Give them vouchers. Give those public schools some competition. It will make all of our schools better.

I want to end this way: Look, it is hard to be a cop. It is hard to be a cop. And cops are like all the rest of us; they are not perfect. They make mistakes.

But only a small, small, small percentage intentionally violate their oath. We need to empower those that abide by their oath because they are the ones keeping our communities safe.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, joining me today on the floor are Mr. James Shea, Mr. Woody Daigle, and Ms. Bernadette Breslin--three very able members of my staff.

Energy Policies

Madam President, I want to talk for a few minutes today about electricity and, more specifically, about how to pay for it.

My people are really struggling right now. Folks in my home State of Louisiana--and I know this is true in your State, Madam President, and across the country--are facing some of the largest energy bills, electricity bills, in the history of ever.

In the past month, I have learned about a woman in Shreveport in my State whose electricity bill went from $182 to $243, a Baton Rouge resident whose bill went from $65 to $353, a citizen from my city of New Orleans whose bill went from $140 to $280 in 1 month.

As one of my people put it, ``Your electricity bill should not be one-third of your paycheck.''

Now, I realize that to some Americans who are fortunate enough to be wealthier, these increases may seem insignificant, but many of my people in Louisiana live from paycheck to paycheck. And put very simply, many of the people in my State and many of their fellow Americans simply cannot afford this.

Now, look, I understand it is hot. I understand it is hot in Louisiana. Here is a news flash: In the summer, it is always hot in Louisiana. Some days, I think that God gave Louisiana a choice between good food and good weather, and we chose good food. I get that.

But heat is not the main reason that these electricity bills are soaring. It is not. The main reason that electricity bills are soaring is because of President Biden's profoundly foolish energy policies which have depleted America's natural gas inventories.

Because of this, natural gas prices have increased 75 percent from 2020--not 9.1 percent that you read in the newspaper or attributed to inflation in general, not 20 percent--75 percent, and they continue to climb.

Entergy is one of the largest electricity providers in my State, particularly in South Louisiana--actually, all over my State. Entergy just sent a letter to its customers, and I want to quote from it. This is what Entergy told its ratepayers and my people:

[T]he cost of natural gas, which we use to operate numerous

power generation facilities, continues to rise. Natural gas

prices in April of 2022 were more than double those in April

of 2021 and three times higher than April 2020. As a result,

these higher-than normal costs will be seen on customer

bills.

That is why my people are so scared. That is why the American people are so scared.

Louisianans are not alone in this. A recent survey--and this is a very reputable research firm called HelpAdvisor--just found that 24 percent--a quarter--of all Americans have reduced or gone without paying basic expenses so they can pay their energy bills, pay their electricity bills.

What country are we living in?

Now, the current energy crisis--and that is what this is--is a sucking chest wound for Louisianans and for Americans. Yet President Biden refuses to budge from his war on affordable energy that got us here.

I will say this: President Biden has been true to his word. On day 1 of his

campaign, he said he would destroy America's energy independence. By God, he has done it. He said that. By God, he has been successful. He killed the Keystone Pipeline. He has canceled our country's mineral leases. He stalled our country's pipelines. He has told his banking regulators to dry up capital and loans for energy production. He has put the full force and weight of the U.S. Government behind this effort to destroy oil and gas. In doing so, he has intentionally forfeited America's energy independence, and that is why electricity bills are so high.

I will give you one example, but I am not going to beat this to death. Earlier this month--I guess just before July 4--President Biden's Department of the Interior released its 5-year Federal leasing plan. That plan contains a maximum--it doesn't even mean they will do this amount--of 11 lease sales for oil and gas producers. Do you know what the last plan proposed was under the prior administration? Forty- seven.

It is clear. I mean, I get it. President Biden does not want the United States of America to produce its own fossil fuels. He just doesn't. His new plan is we are going to forfeit our energy independence.

We have to have oil and gas to run the greatest economy in all of human history. Where are we going to get it if we forfeit our energy independence? Well, we are going to buy up natural gas and oil from countries--foreign countries--that hate us. So those foreign countries will have more money to buy weapons to try to kill us. That is what we are doing.

Now, what is the answer? How do we fix this? Well, the answer--duh-- is to have the American people produce their own oil and gas. We can do it, and we have done it before. We were energy independent. My people in Louisiana know how to produce clean, affordable energy and so do other people in other States.

This is what else my people would tell President Biden if they could speak to him directly. They would say: Mr. President, with all due respect, we can produce natural gas; we can produce oil.

They would go further. They would say: Mr. President, we want you to understand that we don't hate wind, and we don't hate solar. We, the people of Louisiana, want to explore all alternative forms of energy: wind, solar, nuclear, clean hydrogen, hydroelectric.

But they would go further and say: Mr. President, we want a balanced energy policy. Ours is the greatest economy in all of human history, and it uses a lot of energy, and 80 percent of our energy comes from fossil fuels. Do we work every day to make those fossil fuels cleaner? Yes, but we can't do without them. When we try, this is what happens in terms of electricity bills.

There are ways that people can get help. They are struggling right now in my State. For example, for customers in New Orleans, Entergy has created a program called Energy Smart Program. Entergy, the electric power company, will send an employee out to your residence for free and make suggestions about how you can lower your bills.

There are other entities that are trying to help. There is a group called Share the Light and another group called SMILE. These are local nonprofits in Lafayette that will try to help people in their areas who are having trouble paying their electricity bills.

SLEMCO is also offering a terrific utility assistance program that would provide a one-time $300 grant payment for people who can't pay their electricity bills.

Of course, there are also programs under my State's Louisiana Housing Corporation, such as LIHEAP and the Weatherization Assistance Program, that can help folks reduce their electricity bills.

Let me close in this way. Two years ago, I was on this same floor and in this very same spot--right here. I was able to talk about how our economy was soaring. Two years ago, I was able to proudly say that we in America were energy independent, that unemployment was at record lows, and that Americans had more money in their pockets. We can have that again. The American people deserve it. We can have it again but not if President Biden continues to double down on what, in my judgment, is his bone-deep, down-to-the-marrow, foolish energy policy, which, when you scrub away all the rhetoric, amounts to this: wind, solar, and wishful thinking.

You can't produce electricity with wishful thinking. My people's bills are way too high, and they don't have to be that high if President Biden would just listen.

I yield to Senator Marshall.

Mr. President, I rise today for two reasons: one happy, one not so happy.

First, I want to take a moment to recognize a much admired Louisiana journalist. I am referring to Ms. Kim Holden from the wonderful city of New Orleans in my State. Kim has just retired from WVUE, which we sometimes call FOX 8 News, in Louisiana, and Ms. Holden has been with FOX 8 News for 34 years.

Kim, if I may call her by her first name, is Louisiana through and through. She is what most of us would call a star-spangled professional. Ms. Holden graduated from St. Mary's Dominican High School. I know, to some of you, that doesn't mean much, but it is an extraordinarily good school in my State.

She started out at Tulane University. She wanted to study premed, but she realized pretty quickly that premed wasn't for her. She discovered her love for journalism, and she went to and graduated from Loyola University in New Orleans with a major in communications.

She took her first job in 1988 as an intern at WVUE FOX 8, and she never left. Kim's talent and intelligence was quickly recognized at FOX 8. She was hired almost immediately after being an intern as a part- time production assistant.

Throughout her 34 years at FOX 8, she has worked as a producer, as a reporter, as a weekend anchor, and as an assistant news director. In 2005, Ms. Holden started anchoring the morning

newscast, and she has coanchored at 5 and 10 p.m. for the last 12 years.

It is a very unique thing, as you know, Mr. President, in television to work your entire career in one place, particularly in your hometown. Most journalists move from city to city--not Kim. She loves New Orleans, and New Orleans loves her back.

I have been interviewed any number of times, with great admiration from Ms. Holden--not always with great joy because Kim is tough. She is tough as a boot as a journalist. She does her job, but she is very, very fair. She is in a world now of agenda journalists who have an agenda of their own--not Kim Holden. Not Kim Holden. She called the balls and the strikes. I don't even know what party she is in. I don't care which party she is in. She was just a pro.

Kim, as I said, has retired, and she has had an extraordinary career. When you go back and look at her awards, she has received an Emmy and two Edward R. Murrow Awards for reporting. The Associated Press named her Reporter of the Year twice.

Throughout her career at FOX 8 News, Kim has covered everything from the COVID-19 pandemic to hurricanes, including Hurricane Katrina, to the New Orleans Saints winning the Super Bowl.

I think, in her next chapter, Ms. Holden is going to spend some quality time--she deserves it--with her husband Bobby and her four children and her six grandchildren.

So I just wanted to recognize Kim Holden today and to thank her for giving so much to the profession of journalism and to thank her for giving so much to my State in Louisiana. And I wish her the best in her next chapter.

Mr. President, I have with me today some summer associates from my office, and I ask unanimous consent that the following of my colleagues be granted floor privileges until August 12, 2022: Mr. John Luke Lary, Mr. Maximo Valobra, Mr. Jakob Greer, Mr. Jase McDonald, and Mr. Mathias Brantley--here in the back.

Mr. President, most of my people in Louisiana, I think, are probably much like your people in Maine. Most of my people--most of our people--they just get up every day and go to work. They obey the law. They pay their taxes. They try to do the right thing by their kids, try to teach their kids morals. And they try to save a little money for retirement as they enjoy living in what they believe is the greatest country in all of human history. But many of my people, Mr. President, are struggling.

President Biden took office on January 20 of last year. So--what are we?--we are in day 490 of Build Back Better. From where many of my people sit, nothing has been built and nothing is back and nothing is better. There is not a more appropriate example of that than the cost of living, inflation.

When President Biden took office, the cost of gasoline in my State was $2--$2 a gallon. It is between $4.15 and $4.25 right now. And it is not just gasoline, Mr. President. I mean, I don't need to tell you. A dozen eggs now costs $2.52. Ground beef is $5.41. A pound of chicken is $4.10.

The price of oil, the price of gasoline affects so much in terms of our economy. I mean, most of our food and our clothes and our plastics, the things we use every day, are delivered by air, by van, by tanker, all of which use gasoline. Pharmaceuticals are affected by the price of oil.

I don't think it is any secret that the Biden administration is trying to disrupt the production of oil in America. I think that is just a fact. We see it in the President canceling leases on Federal lands in the Gulf of Mexico, in ANWR. We see it from the difficult regulatory environment for oil and gas producers.

The President has just promulgated new rules for the National Environmental Policy Act. If those new rules come to fruition, it will be impossible to open a new pipeline in America, and I think we have to be honest about that.

Now, to be fair, the Biden administration is trying to disrupt the production of oil and gas, especially oil, for environmental reasons, of which we are both aware. But, instead, the Biden administration-- this seems curious to me--wants us to buy oil from foreign countries. And those foreign countries deliver their oil in tankers that use 2,000 gallons of fuel an hour and emit 8 tons of carbon dioxide into the environment per hour. The irony of this is rich.

Inflation and oil--once again, I think so much of our inflation in all of the products that we need to maintain our standard of living today starts with the price of oil. Now, President Biden has said he has no control over the price of oil and, therefore, the price of gasoline. But, Mr. President, you can't have regulatory control over the drilling, the transporting, the storage, the refining, the trading, and the taxation of oil as the President does and say you have no control over the price of the commodity. I mean, that is just not true.

Here is what most people in my State see, Mr. President. The President, in March of last year, sent every American a $1,400 stimulus check. And they were grateful, but then the Biden administration, for its next trick, crashed their 401(k)s, increased their food bills by as much--for some as much as $3,000 a year; increased their rent, for many as much as $2,000 a year; and increased their gas bills for many as much as $1,000 a year.

And they don't see that as a good trade, Mr. President. And it is all derived from President Biden's energy policy, which is--here is his energy policy: wind, solar, and wishful thinking. It is just not realistic. And among other things, it is hurting our country. It is hurting my people in Louisiana desperately because of the rise in gasoline prices.

I was very disappointed to see this week that the President has changed his approach to inflation and the price of gasoline. He has said we are now in a transition period, and he said it as if that were a positive thing. He said we are on a transition, and when we get through this transition, we are going to be stronger than ever because we are not going to have to rely on fossil fuels.

And I am thinking, you know, I respect the President; but honestly, what planet did he parachute in from?

I had just finished reading JPMorgan's energy report; and JPMorgan, looking out until 2030--not 2050, 2030--just 8 years from now--said, in 2030, at the rate we are going, the demand for energy in America will be 20 percent greater than the supply. You know what that is going to do to the price, Mr. President. The JPMorgan energy report said that, at a minimum, in 2030, 8 years from now, the demand for oil is going to be 10 percent higher in America and the demand for natural gas is going to be 18 percent higher. You know what that is going to do to

prices. And the President is talking about this glorious transition as if this is going to last forever.

I don't know about the good people of Maine, but the good people of Louisiana, they just can't afford it. And my people deserve better.

Now, what is the answer? Here is my opinion: We have got to stop spending. The Federal Reserve has got to be given a chance to do its job. The U.S. Congress has a budget that we have set for the United States of America. We need to live within our budget. Except for defense spending, we need to freeze spending. We need to freeze it and give the Federal Reserve a chance to get this inflation under control.

Thank you, Mr. President. My people deserve better. The people of America deserve better.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I call up my amendment number--and Senator Cassidy's amendment No. 4983 and ask that it be reported by number.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to be recognized for up to 2 minutes of debate; Senator Cassidy for 1 minute of debate; and Senator Schatz for 2 minutes of debate prior to the vote.

Madam President, in 2020, Hurricane Laura hit Louisiana,

then Hurricane Marco hit us, then Hurricane Delta hit us, then Hurricane Zeta, then Hurricane Ida--all in a period of 2 years.

Those storms caused $150 billion in damage. My amendment and Senator Cassidy's amendment will appropriate $2.5 billion in disaster aid to Louisiana. That would include $600 million for housing aid for Hurricanes Laura and Delta and $1.4 billion in housing aid for Hurricane Ida. The amendment would also provide for $500 million in funding to rebuild Louisiana ports.

I am mindful of the fact that we should make sure this aid is paid for. I would remind everyone that through the heroic efforts of Senator Schatz and Senator Cantwell, in which I played a small part, that we forced our FCC not to give away the C-band to our telecommunications industry and, instead, auctioned it out, in which case it brought in $81 billion.

And I think we can spare a little bit of that for people who lost their homes and businesses through no fault of their own.

I yield the floor.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, as you know and as my colleagues know, our budget process is finally moving.

I wanted to come down to the Senate floor today to say a few words about the need for disaster relief. I am going to talk about Louisiana but not just Louisiana. Two States in particular come to mind: Kentucky and New York. I hesitate to single out specific States because I don't want to denigrate the needs in other States. We have a number of States that need disaster relief, and the way to address that issue, it seems to me, is in our budget bill.

As you know, Louisiana has, like many of our sister States, suffered many natural disasters throughout our history. My constituents, my people, are very tough. They are very tired, but they are very tough. The reason they are tired is because they have been through a nightmare in the past year and a half--I guess 2 years now. They faced what has felt to me like a nonstop series of hurricanes, of storms, of floods. No matter how many times you have been through a natural disaster, I can tell you, it doesn't get any easier to see your home demolished or to see your home flood or to see your business blown away.

That is why, as we are working out a government budget deal--and I hope we can work out a budget deal--I want to make sure that Washington doesn't forget about my people in Louisiana or forget about the other Americans who, through no fault of their own, have sustained damage from a natural disaster and need a little help.

The storms and the floods that hit Louisiana in the last year and a half are not just a distant memory for many of my people. Louisiana families are going to have to live with the consequences of everything the gulf has been throwing at us for a while. That means broken buildings. That means wrecked homes. That means destroyed businesses. That means debris cluttering the streets. And that doesn't even begin to describe the mental anguish of having a hurricane uproot your life and your livelihood and your kids' education and your ability to go to church on Sunday.

I wanted to remind all of my colleagues today of the litany of catastrophes that have befallen my State. I mention this list not to ask for your pity. Let me say it again. Louisianians are tough. We are tough as a boot. We are tired. But I want my colleagues to understand that I am not talking about a simple rain shower here. My people have been through a lot.

In August of 2020, Hurricane Laura made landfall in Louisiana. Hurricane

Laura destroyed or damaged more than 100,000 homes. Laura leveled or damaged almost every single building--every one--in the city of Lake Charles.

Then came Hurricane Delta right behind Laura in October of 2020. Delta left more than half a million Americans--rather, Louisianians and Americans, of course--without power, not just for a few minutes, not just for a few hours, for days.

That very same month, Hurricane Zeta tore through Louisiana. Zeta caused approximately 400,000 Louisianians to lose power and damaged many of their homes and businesses.

A few months went by, and now we are in February of 2021. A historic winter storm hit my State, froze my State, and 37,000 people lost power.

Now, even when temperatures warmed, we didn't find any relief because that May, historic rainfall soaked parts of my State. By parts, I don't mean a little bitty corner of my State; I mean big parts of my State. The rainfall drenched Lake Charles. Remember, I referenced Lake Charles with respect to Laura, which had already been battered. Twelve inches of rain hit Lake Charles. You know the result. If you get 12 inches of rain in a short period of time, as we did in Lake Charles, you are going to flood; I don't care if you live on Pikes Peak.

Then Hurricane Ida made landfall in August of 2021. Ida was one of the worst hurricanes ever to devastate my State and one of the worst hurricanes ever to make landfall in the United States of America. The only hurricanes that have matched its strength in terms of wind speed are Hurricane Laura and the Last Island Hurricane of 1856. Wind speeds for Hurricane Ida were clocked at well over 100 miles per hour; in some cases, 120, 135 miles per hour. Ida damaged more than 90,000 homes and caused roughly a fifth of all the people in my State to lose power--and I don't mean to lose power for a little while; lose power for days, weeks, months.

We are still catching our breath, as you can tell, but just as we were about to catch our breath, we had another hurricane, Hurricane Nicholas. It hit Louisiana with, depending on the area, between 5 and 10 inches of rain, and that was only a few weeks after Ida.

Now, after all of these floods, after all of these hurricanes, after all of these storms, after all of these catastrophic rain events, after this terrible string of disasters, FEMA is implementing Risk Rating 2.0, a plan that is going to make flood insurance virtually unaffordable for the people of America and for the people of Louisiana.

Louisiana families--again, we are not asking for your pity. We don't want pity in Louisiana. We are proud people. We are tough people. But we are tired, and we pay taxes like everybody else does. And just like some citizens in other States--Kentucky and New York, to name two--we need a little help.

We need to address all of these needs--not just for my State but for the other States that need help--in our budget. If you add up the damage estimates from Hurricanes Laura, Delta, Zeta, and Ida, we are talking about 130,000 homes destroyed. According to estimates from my State back home, from the Governor and the legislature, Louisiana still needs hundreds of millions of dollars to help fix the damage Laura and Delta inflicted on our housing and the small businesses of Southwest Louisiana. Frankly--I mentioned Ida and the severity of Ida--the damages for Ida will probably cost a little more than $2.5 billion.

We in Louisiana have recovered from natural disasters before, and we are going to recover from these, but we are going to need help to rebuild, just like the people from Kentucky are going to need help; just like the people from New York are going to need help; just like the folks, my fellow citizens out West, are going to need help to recover from wildfires.

I fought before to get disaster recovery relief for my people. I don't think I have ever voted against a disaster relief bill to help my neighbors in other States, and I am going to keep fighting. I urge my colleagues not to forget the people in Louisiana and the people of America who have suffered these natural disasters as we work out our budget.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be able to speak for up to 15 minutes, Senator Marshall for up to 5 minutes, and Senator Menendez for up to 5 minutes before the scheduled rollcall votes.

I want to speak on two topics.

First, on inflation, President Biden's economic policies, unfortunately, have water-boarded the budgets of most Americans and most Louisianians. We see the official statistics, and the statistics are that inflation is going up 7 percent. I understand that is what the experts say, but most Americans and most Louisianians know that inflation is much worse, much worse.

I am sure that has been the experience of the good people of Georgia as well. I mean, I did some calculations before I came down today. From December of 2020 to December of 2021, the most recent numbers we have, gasoline is up 49.6 percent.

In my State, in Louisiana, it costs Louisianians $27 more than it did last year to fill up the tank of a Chevy truck. That is every time they fill up the tank.

Used car and truck prices have increased by 37.3 percent. In New Orleans, for example, in my State, used car prices were up 38.2 percent through last September.

We all have to eat. Meat, poultry, fish, eggs, up 12.5 percent.

New vehicles, if you can find one, up 11.8 percent.

Household furnishings and furniture, up 7.4 percent. Electricity, up 6.3 percent and headed higher. Clothes, 5.8 percent. Fruits and vegetables, 5 percent. Cereals and bakery products, 4.8 percent. And I could keep going.

The truth is that most Americans are having to spend, on average, about $3,500 more per year because of President Biden's inflation.

Now, to some people, that may not sound like much, that is a lot of money for people in my State. An extra $3,500 out of the budget of most working Americans is a lot.

You know, I wish it weren't so, but this inflation has been caused by the Biden administration's economic policies. Inflation is not complicated. It is too much money chasing too few goods.

President Biden's coronavirus bill was the tipping point. That is clear. Now, we all voted for a number of coronavirus bills, but the last coronavirus bill was way too expensive. It was unnecessary, and it wasn't a coronavirus bill.

The President said: Oh, we have got an emergency. We have got an emergency.

And then you read the bill and find out that the bill has got nothing to do with the coronavirus and the money is going to be spent over like a 10-year period. That is not an emergency.

The current inflation has characteristics--I have not seen this--of both cost-push and demand-pull inflation, and it can be traced directly to the economic policies of the Biden administration.

And the Biden administration keeps pushing. He keeps trying to stuff more diapers down the toilet. The Biden administration wants to throw another $5 trillion--not billion, not million, but trillion--of gasoline on the fire in the Build Back Better bill. And if we pass that, there will be another trillion dollars.

I mean, this administration spends money like it was gully dirt. I have never seen anything like it.

And then we have inflation. We have all this liquidity, which leads to inflation, and the Biden administration will not accept responsibility.

President Biden has blamed inflation--he blamed it first on COVID. Now, I will admit COVID is spreading, but I don't see people walking around coughing inflation on each other. Then he blamed it--I think he blamed it on China for a while. Then President Biden blamed it on greedy corporations. I expect next he will say that inflation originated in a bat.

But the truth of the matter is, it is not complicated. It originated with his spending policies, and it is just killing my people. It is killing them.

And, as you know, we have a lot going on here in Washington and a lot of issues in front of us that are important--Ukraine, for example. The President shortly is going to nominate a new member to our U.S. Supreme Court. We have a multitude of bills that we are considering, and all of those are important.

But inflation is important too, and it is hurting the American people, and it is hurting the least among us the most. Yes, we are seeing inflation in terms of services, but we are seeing inflation more in terms of goods, and low-income Americans, as you well know, spend proportionately more of their income on goods than they do on services.

The President's policies, I regret to have to say, have administered a sucking chest wound on the budgets of the people in my State and the people of America, and it has got to stop.