Floor Statements

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to S. Res. 406.

I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to S. Res. 422.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the en bloc consideration of the following resolutions, which are at the desk: S. Res. 432, S. Res. 433, S. Res. 434, S. Res. 435, S. Res. 436, and S. Res. 437.

I ask unanimous consent that the resolutions be agreed to, the preambles be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table en bloc.

The resolutions were agreed to.

The preambles were agreed to.

(The resolutions, with their preambles, are printed in today's Record under ``Submitted Resolutions.'')

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 10 a.m. on Tuesday, October 7; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of the en bloc nominations provided for under the provisions of S. Res. 412, postcloture; further, that all time during recess, adjournment, leader remarks, and morning business count postcloture on the nominations; finally, that the Senate recess from 12:30 p.m. until 2:15 p.m. to allow for the weekly conference meetings.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, it has been 2 weeks since our first vote on a clean continuing resolution to keep the government open. This shutdown could have been avoided well before it began. But because Democrats have not budged from their partisan demands, the shutdown is now entering its third day.

There is a lot that we could be doing right now. We could be considering bipartisan appropriations bills through regular order, going to conference on the three appropriations bills we passed in August, or passing the bipartisan annual Defense bill. But instead, we are stuck in a shutdown mess of Democrats' making, and the American people are suffering as a result.

Republicans remain united around a clean, nonpartisan funding extension. It has passed the House of Representatives, and it is currently sitting right here in the Senate, ready to be voted on. It has no new Republican policies, no partisan policy riders. It is straightforward, simple, and clean.

All it does is reopen the government through November 21 to give us more time to pass appropriations bills here on the floor. We have a number of bipartisan bills waiting for floor consideration right now. The only thing standing in the way of reopening the government and getting back to doing the important work is Democrats' $1.5 trillion in partisan spending demands. That is right, $1.5 trillion.

Their partisan proposal demands more money--think about this--more money than our entire defense budget just to keep the government open for 4 weeks. That is not a credible proposal. It is a far-left wish list, and it is not how we are going to do things around here.

We can end this shutdown in just a few hours. We need to take one rollcall vote--just one rollcall vote--on the House-passed clean continuing resolution. The President of the United States says that he is ready to sign it. We just need a handful of Democrats to agree.

Now, once we get the government back open, then we can talk about the issues that Democrats are raising, but we can't do that while they are holding the Federal Government hostage to their partisan demands.

Whatever Democrats are saying publicly, I think, privately, they are all well aware of the problems with their current position.

The senior Senator from Massachusetts has said:

Hostage tactics are the last resort for those who can't

otherwise win their fights through elections, can't win their

fights in Congress, can't win their fights for the

Presidency, and can't win their fights in the Courts.

The Democrat leader called shutdowns ``a politics of idiocy, of confrontation, of paralysis.''

Mr. President, this shutdown needs to end sooner rather than later, and there is only one way out of it: Democrats need to vote for the clean, nonpartisan continuing resolution sitting right there. All it takes is one rollcall vote--the government is back open. We need to get this government back open, which we can do very, very quickly, and then we can talk about whatever we need to talk about.

Just a few years ago, the Democrat leader had this to say:

We're allowed to come here and disagree over policy. In

fact, our system of government was designed to allow for

progress despite our large and sometimes raucous differences.

But when one side . . . throws a temper tantrum and uses the

basic functioning of our government as leverage in a policy

argument, our system of government breaks down.

Let's hope the Democrat leader decides to heed his own words and that Democrats' temper tantrum ends sooner rather than later.

Later today, in a couple of hours, Democrats will have another opportunity to vote for the clean continuing resolution, and we will see if they are still committed to their shutdown politics. Republicans remain ready to reopen the government and to get back to doing the American people's business.

How much longer this shutdown lasts depends entirely on Democrats. The choice is theirs.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I move to proceed to the motion to reconsider the cloture vote on the motion to proceed to H.R. 5371.

Madam President, I move to reconsider the cloture vote on the motion to proceed to H.R. 5371.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 168, H.R. 5371.

I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider the en bloc nominations listed in S. Res. 412.

Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume legislation session.

Mr. President, we are into the second day of a government shutdown after Democrats, once again, rejected a clean, nonpartisan funding bill to keep the government open while we continue bipartisan appropriations work. We are not going to be voting today, as we have Jewish colleagues who are currently observing Yom Kippur, but we will be voting tomorrow. And we are going to give my Democratic colleagues another opportunity to reopen the government by passing the clean, nonpartisan funding extension before us.

I realize that my Democrat colleagues are facing pressure from Members of their far-left base, but they are playing a losing game here. A robust majority of American voters are against a government shutdown. Even some Democrat Members are raising concerns, with a Democrat House Member noting yesterday:

This government shutdown is the result of hardball politics

driven by the demands far-left groups are making for

Democratic Party leaders to put on a show of their opposition

to President Trump. The shutdown is hurting Americans and our

economy . . . normal

policy disagreements are no reason to subject our

constituents to the continued harm of this shutdown.

That, from a Democrat House Member.

Organizations ranging from the National Fraternal Order of Police to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to the Teamsters have spoken out against shutting down the government. The Teamsters president said Tuesday:

A shutdown will hurt working people. Period. Senators

should . . . pass the House-passed clean, short-term funding

bill.

Senators should . . . pass the House-passed clean, short-

term funding bill.

That, again, from the president of the Teamsters. ``Clean'' is what he said.

My Democrat colleagues have little to work with in this debate, with their own previous statements working against them, and so they have tried to portray the clean, nonpartisan funding bill before us as something other than what it is.

But the Teamsters president reminds us of the facts. We are not asking Democrats to swallow a list of new Republican policies or partisan demands--not in there. We are asking Democrats to do nothing more than pass a clean, nonpartisan bill to fund the government for a few more weeks so that we can get back to bipartisan appropriations work.

And I said ``bipartisan appropriations work''--the kind of bipartisan work that has seen the Senate pass three appropriations bills so far by robust bipartisan margins, the kind of work that we want to continue once Democrats have stopped holding government funding hostage to a long list of partisan demands.

So far, three of our Democrat colleagues have joined Republicans to attempt to reopen the government. If we can just find a few more Democrats to join us, we can end this shutdown and get back to bipartisan appropriations work and the business of the American people.

Democrats voted for clean CRs like the one before us 13 times--13 times--during the Biden administration. I hope they will join us to pass this clean CR and reopen the government for hard-working Americans.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 11:30 a.m. on Friday, October 3; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and notwithstanding rule XXII, the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of S. Res. 412, postcloture, and that all postcloture time be expired at 1:30 p.m.

Mr. President, for the information of my colleagues, Senators should expect a series of votes at 1:30 p.m.