Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, as the Senate turns now to debate the bipartisan appropriations bill to resource military construction and the VA that Senator Boozman and I have assembled, along with all of our colleagues on the Appropriations Committee, I would like to highlight what is included in this legislation.

This bill represents bipartisan support for our military servicemembers and veterans and their families. It enhances our military readiness and the quality of life for servicemembers while funding the delivery of care and benefits for our Nation's veterans.

Military construction funds are included for infrastructure that supports our servicemembers' quality of life at home and abroad and for the construction of facilities vital to our national security.

In the State of Georgia, for example, this bill includes resources to build a brandnew elementary school at Fort Benning, where there is currently a wait-list of more than 200 families trying to get into school on the base; resources to construct a new barracks at Fort Stewart, where housing has desperately needed upgrades following alarming reports of mold and pest infestation; resources to bring the F-35A flight simulators to Moody Air Force Base in Valdosta and accelerate the arrival of those aircraft to South Georgia; resources to replace the control tower at Robins Air Force Base, where our servicemembers are currently working in a tower with a leaking roof, no air-conditioning, and a broken elevator; resources for major upgrades at Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay, where they are continuing to prepare for the arrival of Columbia-class submarines.

Across the country, family housing for servicemembers operated by private companies has long been a disaster, as evidenced by my investigation of conditions for families living on post at Fort Gordon.

That is why this bill rejects the administration's proposed cuts to oversight of privatized family housing and provides additional resources for construction of new family housing. These are young men and women, as you well know through your service, Mr. President--many of them 19, 21, 23 years old--who signed up to serve not for money or for glory but out of their love for our country. Their entire families make sacrifices on behalf of our Nation, and they should not have to sacrifice safe, clean housing, and high-quality schools.

For years, the Department has neglected quality of life, health, and safety for enlisted servicemembers, and that neglect extends to those servicemembers' families. But this bill provides necessary and overdue investments in military quality of life.

Now to the VA. Let's be clear that these programs, services, and benefits are not a giveaway; they are the Nation's obligation to those who have put their lives and health on the line and made tremendous sacrifices and family sacrifices in defense of the United States.

For the VA, this bill provides resources to support healthcare for more than 9.2 million veterans and disability benefits to nearly 7 million veterans, survivors, and their families.

Instead of continuing senseless mass firings of VA personnel, this bill provides funding so that the VA can recruit and hire to fill long- term clinical vacancies that are contributing to long wait times for care in Georgia and across the country.

Asserting our constitutional power of the purse, this bill mandates specific funding levels for rural health, women's health, caregivers, research, and veteran homelessness prevention programs, in some cases, including required spending levels for those programs for the first time in legislative history.

It also provides funding for the VA to address the claims backlog related to toxic exposures and the implementation of the PACT Act, to continue providing education benefits to veterans, and to help secure VA home loans. All of these critical resources will better ensure that our Nation's veterans receive the care and benefits they have earned through their service.

This bill also provides necessary funding for the American Battle Monuments Commission, the U.S. Court of Veterans Appeals, and the Armed Forces Retirement Homes, as well as Arlington National Cemetery.

As ranking member of the subcommittee, I was pleased to work closely with Chairman Boozman to build a strong bipartisan bill that reflects input from colleagues on both sides of the aisle, not just on the Appropriations Committee but across the entire Senate. And I thank Senator Boozman for his collaboration and for his bipartisan work in good faith, and I extend that gratitude to Senators Collins and Murray.

Every Senator, in both parties, has had the opportunity to advocate for their State's interests and priorities, and Chairman Boozman and I have worked together to address, to the best of our ability, every Senator's needs and concerns.

Now, this bill earned bipartisan support in the Appropriations Committee because it equips the VA to make good on America's sacred promise that our servicemembers and veterans will have the resources and support they have earned through their service to our country. I encourage colleagues to come and speak with me directly about any questions or concerns with this legislation so that we can set up votes and get this bill passed in the Senate as swiftly as possible and ultimately enacted into law.

This is a bipartisan bill that was built through thoughtful deliberation, hard work, and compromise. That is how the appropriations process should work, not on the basis of party line but in the spirit of bipartisan collaboration and the national interest.

So let's deliver for the American people, the people of Georgia, our servicemembers, military families, and veterans, with the resources they need, on time, responsibly, and on a bipartisan basis.

I urge a ``yes'' vote to proceed to the bill.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I want to urge my colleagues--and I know there is this temptation of the upcoming summer break, and folks want to get home to their families, but we have the opportunity and the obligation right now to pass this legislation for the Crime Victims Fund. Are we really going to miss this opportunity and this obligation when, in my State, a quarter of the victims of domestic violence were turned away from services last year?

These are the organizations--the child advocacy centers, the domestic violence agencies, the rape crisis centers--that respond to the needs of the most vulnerable, neglected, and abused people in our States.

We just spent last week defunding Big Bird. We spent an entire week defunding public television and public radio. And you mean to tell me that before we leave for the recess, we can't fund child advocacy centers, domestic violence agencies, and rape crisis centers? It is unacceptable. This has bipartisan support, and we should pass this legislation right now.

Here is what one organization in Georgia said if we fail to pass this bill. They said:

Our organization would have to lay off approximately 50% of

essential staff. We would not be able to support or meet the

critical needs of victims in the community. The lack of

support and services over time will negatively impact the

community with an increase in crime and victimization.

Mr. President, another organization in Georgia said:

Without our centers, states will see an increase in

domestic injuries, child abuse, sexual assault, and even

death in many cases.

Child abuse. Sexual assault. Death.

In the State of Georgia, where hundreds of foster children have been trafficked by sexual predators, these are the organizations that support them and women facing domestic violence.

This is a bipartisan bill led by Senators Durbin and Murkowski. It should have bipartisan support on the Senate floor right now. We should pass it before we leave for the summer.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise to honor WSB Radio and Children's Healthcare of Atlanta as they mark the 25th anniversary of their annual Care-a-Thon, a Georgia tradition of compassion, generosity, and service.

Founded in 2001, WSB Radio and CHOA's annual Care-a-Thon has raised more than $34 million to support the Aflac Cancer and Blood Disorders Center at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta--one of the leading pediatric cancer centers in the Nation--supporting research, the family support team, and the fellowship program at the Aflac Cancer and Blood Disorders Center.

Each summer, WSB Radio's hosts, volunteers, and listeners come together for a 2-day radio marathon sharing stories of courage and raising critical funds for research, family support, and physician training.

The annual Care-a-Thon helps ensure Georgia's children battling cancer receive world-class treatment and the holistic care they need while battling cancer.

I commend WSB Radio, Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, their teams, and everyone who supports these efforts for 25 years of work to help kids battling terrible disease.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2853 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, many of us in the Senate are parents or grandparents of young children.

This is Abdullah. He was a 1-year-old, starving in a war zone in Yemen until his life was saved by emergency rations sent by the American people through UNICEF.

This bill ends the entire direct American contribution to UNICEF. Are we so calloused by politics that we would make this grievous and avoidable error, moral error? Do we believe it is the will of our constituents that children like Abdullah should die?

We are U.S. Senators with the power through this vote to save children's lives and to spare their parents the heartbreak of a small child's death. Vote aye.

Mr. President.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, I call up my amendment No. 2696 and ask it be reported by number.

Madam President, instead of adding trillions to the debt in tax cuts to the rich while destroying Medicaid and renewable energy, I propose we help our constituents afford health insurance.

If we allow Affordable Care Act benefits to expire, as this bill would, more than a million Georgians will pay more for health insurance next year. A family of four in Clayton County making $65,000 a year, that is a $2,600 increase in the cost of health insurance; Dougherty County, $2,200; Chattahoochee County, $2,300; Augusta-Richmond County, $2,600; Liberty County, $2,600; Macon-Bibb County, $2,700.

The AJC, our paper, reports 300,000 Georgians would lose insurance altogether. And that is on top of the cuts to Medicaid and hospitals.

A vote against this amendment is a vote to gut the Affordable Care Act and raise health insurance premiums. I urge a ``yes'' vote.

How much time do I have remaining?

A vote against this amendment will repeal the Affordable Care Act benefits for your constituents and raise their healthcare premium.

Motion To Waive

And pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, I move to waive section 302(f) of that act for purposes of this amendment.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, on Saturday, June 21, 2025, at President Trump's direction, U.S. forces struck certain nuclear facilities in Iran. As I stated this week in the Intelligence Committee: Those strikes having been taken, I certainly hope they were effective. Most of the Congress is united in our conviction that Iran must not build or acquire a nuclear weapon. An urgent unanswered question is whether the administration's use of force meaningfully advanced that longstanding foreign policy objective. Members of Congress are seeking further information from the administration in order to determine whether these strikes were effective.

Tonight, I voted to discharge S.J. Res. 59 from the Foreign Relations Committee. Such discharge would require the Senate to debate whether congressional authorization should be required for any further offensive military action against Iran. Given the stakes for U.S. national security, the safety of military servicemembers we represent, and the security of our allies, Senators owe the American people that debate, consistent with our constitutional role in the formation of U.S. foreign policy.

The administration has argued that last Saturday's strikes were within the President's inherent article II authorities as Commander in Chief. That debate is not relevant to Senator Kaine's S.J. Res. 59, which would pertain to future military action.

Indeed, the question for the Senate tonight was not whether the President's use of force to date has been legal and constitutional or whether the strikes themselves were necessary and effective. The question was: Should the Senate robustly debate whether any future offensive military action should require congressional approval? Given the stakes for our national security

and our constituents who serve in the Armed Forces, I regret that Senators refused to bring this measure to the floor for debate.

Madam President, Evyatar David has always loved music, singing, and playing instruments with his brother Ilay and his sister Yaela at Shabbat dinners. Evyatar dreams of becoming a music producer one day, and that love of music led Evyatar to the Negev Desert for the Nova Music Festival on October 7, 2023. For months, he had been looking forward to a weekend of music and friends. But instead, Evyatar, is now, as I speak these words on the Senate floor, living his 591st day of captivity in a Hamas dungeon under Gaza.

His brother Ilay told me recently that another hostage, recently freed, brought him a message from Evyatar that Evyatar misses most of all playing music with his family. Instead, Evyatar has been starved and kept in chains with a bag over his head. He and his best friend Guy Gilboa-Dalal have been held together and tortured together.

Evyatar and Guy both have younger sisters, older brothers, parents, friends whose lives are shattered by their absence.

This is Evyatar before, but recent photos show a man abused and malnourished. And he was recently taken to witness the release of other hostages and then returned to captivity simply to torment him.

I first met Evyatar's brother Ilay when he visited Atlanta and then hosted Ilay in my office here in the Senate, and I was inspired by the tenacity of his hope and his relentless effort to ensure his brother is not forgotten. And today I rise to demand Evyatar's freedom and to demand yet again the release of all hostages held in Gaza.

Many of us in Atlanta's Jewish community, including Ohr HaTorah, Beth Jacob, B'nai Torah, and now all of the synagogues of the Atlanta Rabbinical Assembly have decided to adopt Evyatar's case, to call relentlessly for his immediate release and to ensure he is not forgotten or left for dead.

This 24-year-old man has now spent two birthdays in brutal captivity, where he remains right now at this moment, but he belongs at home with his family.

Evyatar, you are not forgotten.

Free Evyatar David. Free him now.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 2186 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, this amendment will reverse Elon Musk's cuts to the Social Security Administration. And before it is denied that this is happening, today, yet another mass firing was reported when service quality is already at a tailspin. Phone services are being terminated, offices are being closed, seniors are waiting on hold for hours, office managers are manning the phones because receptionists are fired, and the website is crashing repeatedly under the strain.

Mr. Musk calls Social Security a Ponzi scheme but refuses to testify before Congress. I know he is rich and powerful, but where are the subpoenas? American seniors deserve transparency.

Secretary Lutnick said his mother-in-law wouldn't complain if she missed a Social Security check. Maybe that is because her son-in-law is a billionaire. But Georgia seniors don't have that luxury.

Support this amendment. Stand with America's seniors over the richest man in the world.

How much time is remaining?

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, the momentum that is growing in Washington to gut the Medicaid program is alarming my constituents in Georgia, and I call up my amendment No. 407 and ask it to be reported by number.

The sheer number of people affected: In Georgia 5 out of 7 seniors in nursing homes are covered by Medicaid; nearly 50 percent of all births are covered by Medicaid; two out of five children in Georgia are covered by Medicaid. I was disappointed to see just moments ago the majority adopt an amendment to lay the foundation for deep cuts to Medicaid.

I hope we can build bipartisan support for my amendment to ensure that maternal and children's healthcare through Medicaid is protected.

Mr. President, the vote is whether to protect maternal and pediatric healthcare through Medicaid.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, it is truly astounding that the Senate stands on the brink of confirming Mr. Kennedy to lead America's public health Agencies.

If the Senate weren't gripped in this soon to be infamous period of total capitulation, I don't think this nominee would have made it as far as a hearing. If I told you a couple of years ago: There is a guy who has been nominated to run public health nationwide. His job will be to protect American families from death and disease. He is going to run the whole public health system--Medicare, Medicaid, the CDC, the NIH, all of it. He will decide how we protect the country from infectious disease. He will set the rules for every hospital in the country. He will decide what healthcare and medicines get covered by Medicare. He will manage our response in the event of a pandemic.

And then I told you: Well, there are a few concerns about this nominee. First of all, zero relevant experience. He is a trial lawyer, a politician from a famous family, no medical or scientific background. He has never run a hospital or a health system or anything like that.

Second of all, he has said some pretty wild stuff about public health over and over and over again, like, he proposed that COVID-19 might be ``ethnically targeted'' to spare Jews--``ethnically targeted'' to spare Jews. He said Lyme disease was a military bioweapon.

For years, he has been persuading American families against routine childhood immunizations. He has compared the work of the CDC to ``Nazi death camps.''

If a couple of years ago I told you all of that and I told you the Senate was about to put America's health in this man's hands, you would probably tell me the Senate has lost its mind.

By the way, it is OK to challenge scientific consensus, and it is not just OK, it is necessary to question the way we manage our healthcare system and our food system. They are not working. But that is not the issue here. The issue for the Senate is, are we going to put in charge of American public health a man with no relevant credentials, who for decades seems to have latched on to just about every piece of half- baked conspiracist pseudoscience he has come across?

I mentioned earlier that Mr. Kennedy compared the CDC's work to ``Nazi death camps.'' These aren't comments I take lightly given my ancestors were exterminated in Nazi death camps and the folks who work at the CDC are my constituents.

And Mr. Kennedy, if confirmed, will take charge of HHS and, therefore, the CDC, at a moment when an onslaught of political attacks by the new administration have thrown the CDC into chaos. Huge amounts of CDC data and reporting were simply disappeared from the internet-- cancer data, maternal mortality data.

There has been an unprecedented interruption of the ``Mortality and Morbidity Report.'' That is data that has been consistently reported since the 1930s.

Public reporting about bird flu has been interrupted, while it rips through chicken flocks and has been documented jumping to humans.

The administration tried to freeze funding for the CDC's flagship infectious disease monitoring program, the one that detects outbreaks before they are out of control, and that effort was stopped only by a court order.

And we are hearing threats to gut the CDCs workforce, at a time when the country needs the CDC firing on all cylinders to prevent deadly outbreaks of infectious disease.

If this administration guts and gags the CDC, who is going to defend the Nation from Ebola. Who is going to protect kids from measles? Who is going to save us from TB?

And then there is this crusade against health equity--``equity,'' an unspeakable word now under our new official MAGA state ideology. Health equity--that means trying to address the huge race and class disparities in health outcomes that plague our country. For example, it means making sure clinical trials include minority groups so we get good data on how to save all lives, not just some lives. It means figuring out how to get women in remote, rural communities prenatal checkups. It means addressing the fact that maternal mortality for Black women in Georgia is three times higher than for White women.

Trying to make healthcare in America equitable--``equitable,'' meaning dealing fairly with all concerned, no matter how much money you have or

the color of your skin or where you are from--that is important work. The quality of your healthcare shouldn't depend on how you look or how rich you are or where you grew up. And yet this obvious point and the work to address it is suddenly now not just politically incorrect; it is politically forbidden. And the people who do this work are being forced onto administrative leave. They are being shunned, and they are being publicly threatened.

Mr. President, here are excerpts from a letter I received today from a constituent.

Good afternoon, Senator Ossoff. I write to you today with a

heavy heart and a profound sense of concern.

After decades of dedicated service to the Centers for

Disease Control and Prevention--working under both Republican

and Democratic administrations to improve vaccine uptake,

advance health equity, and fight the disparities that have

long plagued underserved communities--I now find myself

facing an alarming and deeply troubling situation.

My constituent continues:

This morning, I was placed on the DEI watch list web site

and publicly identified as a target. Compounding this

distressing reality, my personal and internal CDC-related

information has been exposed on a public web site, placing me

in immediate danger. I have since received unexpected

deliveries to my home, and my personal information is now in

the hands of individuals aligned with the views of the

current administration--individuals whose intentions I cannot

discern but whose actions are already proving to be invasive

and threatening.

The letter goes on.

I am left with no choice but to remain vigilant, prayerful,

and confined to my own home--effectively a prisoner for doing

my duty as a public health professional. The fear and

uncertainty that have overtaken my daily life are not just a

personal burden but a dire warning about the dangers faced by

those who commit themselves to the work of health equity and

public service. Even more distressing is the silence and

inaction of those who should be stepping in to address this

injustice.

That is a letter I received today from a constituent who has served at the CDC for decades and who has now been doxed and publicly targeted and fears for her safety, apparently because working to reduce health disparities for communities and people who have lousy access to healthcare and poor health outcomes makes you a political target.

And this constituent isn't alone. There are dozens more CDC workers in Georgia who have faithfully served our country for years and who face the very same harassment and the same threats.

This is ugly and menacing stuff, and the license for it comes directly from the President of the United States.

Tomorrow morning, unless Senate Republicans can summon a shred of courage, the Senate may be poised to confirm someone to lead America's public health system who is obviously unqualified and unfit.

As we speak, the world's flagship disease control Agency is in chaos and under political attack, and public servants who dare to try to improve health outcomes for the poor and disadvantaged fear for their safety--all brought to you by the President who said: Maybe bleach injections could cure COVID.

None of this bodes well for the health and safety of the American people. I will oppose the Kennedy nomination. It is not too late for my colleagues gripped by political fear to do the same.

Mr. President, I yield 30 minutes of my postcloture debate time on the Vought nomination to Senator Merkley and 30 minutes of my postcloture debate time on the Vought nomination to Senator Schumer.

For the CDC, I vote no.

Madam President, I rise to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Greenbriar Children's Center in Savannah.

Founded in 1949, Greenbriar Children's Center was established by members of the Gamma Sigma Omega chapter of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., to start an orphanage for Black children in the Savannah area.

When the orphanage was founded, Black children who were homeless or without parental support were often placed in local work farms and penal institutions.

Today, Greenbriar serves children and families of all backgrounds and ethnicities, through childcare, early learning programs, family preservation and counseling services, and an emergency shelter for children and young adults.

As Georgia's U.S. Senator, I commend the faculty, staff, and families at Greenbriar for their 75 years of service and for their work to help our kids learn, grow, and thrive.

Madam President, I rise to celebrate the Historic Harrington School, on St. Simons Island, GA, as we commemorate its 100th anniversary this year.

Formerly known as the Harrington Graded School, the Historic Harrington School functioned as the principal educational facility for three African-American communities on St. Simons Island until school consolidation in the 1960s, when students were either bused to the mainland in Brunswick, GA, or were sent to private schools for African- Americans in other parts of the State, such as Augusta and Cordele.

The Harrington community was settled by formerly enslaved families who had worked on the plantations of Georgia's barrier islands. Census data from 1900, 1910, and 1920 revealed an African-American community of sawmill workers and carpenters who, in 1924, built the one-room schoolhouse for the education of their children and grandchildren.

In the 1990s, pressure by developers caused many African-American homes and properties in the Harrington community to be sold and subdivided. Residents who did not want to sell their heritage put up yellow ``Don't Ask/Won't Sell'' signs in their yards.

In 2004, Ms. Isadora Hunter, who attended the school in 1928, donated her portion of family land to the St. Simon's Land Trust and Glynn County, so that the school would be preserved. That same year, Glynn County and the St. Simons Land Trust, Inc., acquired ownership of a 12- acre tract next to the schoolhouse that became a public park.

In 2011, the Historic Harrington School was selected as one of ten ``Places in Peril'' by the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation, identifying the schoolhouse as a significant historic site threatened by deterioration. In 2017, through the grassroots activism of the Friends of Harrington School Inc., the St. Simons African American Heritage Coalition, and members of the local community, funds were raised for the schoolhouse to be completely restored, and the school officially reopened with a ribbon cutting in August of that year. The Harrington tract, acquired by the land trust and the county pursuant to the Georgia Greenspace laws and the Glynn County Greenspace Program, opened as the Harrington Park and is maintained by the county.

Today, the Historic Harrington School is a cultural center where residents and tourists learn about the Gullah Geechee heritage of St. Simons Island and coastal Georgia.

As Georgia's U.S Senator, I join the St. Simons Island community and all Georgians in celebrating this momentous 100th anniversary and important heritage of the Historic Harrington School.