Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, there has been a lot of discussion today following the votes on the floor this morning about healthcare and healthcare costs.

It was just about a year ago exactly--it was December 12 of last year--I spoke to a reporter from Alaska, and we were talking about just the staggering costs of healthcare costs and what we were seeing with the rise at that time. I pointed out to this reporter that Alaska had already seen 3 years of premium increases that exceeded 50 percent in total. This was putting a pressure on individual and household budgets in a way that people were telling me that this is an unsustainable trend.

I said then that we are going to have to address the issue of the enhanced premium tax credits at the Federal level. We are going to need to address the fact that these come to an end at the end of this calendar year. And I said then we have got a year to kind of figure this out, to buy time to pursue what I feel is important, and that is true reform--some of the long-term reforms that will not just help us address the cost of health insurance but, more importantly, the overall cost of healthcare in this country. That is the driver there. That is the problem.

So that was about a year ago--almost exactly a year ago, and yet here we are. Little has changed. Key transparency in legislation remains stalled. Too many Alaskans are facing premium increases that are now approaching 500 percent. Think about what that means. I have shared with some colleagues a text that I received from a friend of mine in Fairbanks, and she and her husband will be looking at the potential for premiums in the range of $36,000. Nobody--nobody that I know of--can afford premiums for $36,000.

So we know we have got a job here in the Congress. We know that we have to address this issue of rising costs to healthcare. But what we are facing right now, literally, on this 11th day of December, the immediate issue is this expiration of the enhanced premium tax credits and this cliff that is in front of thousands of Alaskans--about 24,000 Alaskans. Millions of Americans are facing this.

So this morning we saw what we saw. The Senate voted on two dueling healthcare proposals to address this healthcare cliff. Both proposals were partisan in nature. Neither one was written in a committee setting or reported through what we refer to as the regular order process. Unfortunately, neither really included any attempt at compromise. Neither tried to gain the support from the other side or to address perhaps the very valid concerns that were raised by the other side, and so it is no surprise that we are where we are, which is two failed votes on the Senate floor.

And those measures failed. But, Mr. President, I would just suggest that we have failed. We have failed. This institution here in this Senate, we failed to work together. We failed to reach consensus. We failed to help all those who are facing these, shockingly, completely unaffordable increases in their healthcare premiums as they are looking at the new year.

We voted on a Democratic proposal as part of the agreement that allowed us to reopen the Federal Government after a record-setting but ultimately a pointless 43-day shutdown. And the headline of that measure was that it would extend the current subsidies for 3 years.

Unfortunately--unfortunately--there is no recognition of the much needed reforms. The two speakers preceding me both pointed out there are flaws in the existing system. If we are going to be addressing a program and a continuation of it, I think it is our responsibility to make sure that we are making sure that these programs don't have ways-- that they are not being abused.

We also voted on a Republican proposal which would have prefunded health savings accounts. This is something that so many Americans are very familiar with, but it would allow for Americans to receive dollars more directly in their hands, to go in their pockets for their own care while also funding cost-sharing reductions projected to reduce premium costs down the line and some other provisions. But it was good work by the chairman of the HELP Committee as well working with the chairman of the Finance Committee. And I was encouraged by what we were beginning to see there, but there were flaws, quite honestly, with that approach as well.

So where did I end up? I ended up voting in favor of the motion to proceed to both of these proposals, but I want to be clear here. It is not because I fully endorse the Democratic proposal and I fully endorse the Republican proposal. Neither of the proposals, in fairness, met the challenge, as far as I am concerned.

The Democratic proposal would have extended the status quo under the Affordable Care Act which, as we have heard, has failed to restrain costs, and it has done so for longer than necessary to build the stability that I think we need to develop better policy.

More importantly, it included no reforms--no reforms whatsoever. We have seen examples of how the system has been abused, and as stewards of Federal taxpayer dollars, it is incumbent on us to address matters like that.

So making sure that there were legitimate reforms, making sure that we don't set up another cliff just like we would have done under the Democratic proposal--it would have set up another cliff in 2029. And that cliff would look even more staggering if we just continued to allow and subsidize unchecked premium growth.

And then on the Republican proposal over here, again, I give credit to the authors of that measure because it did focus on some longer term reforms that I do believe can help people over time. But what it didn't address was the immediate situation that folks are facing: this immediate cliff, the imminent pain that is going to come with this massive spike in premiums in Alaska.

Again, maybe it is more extreme in other States, but we are still one of the 50 States. And when you are talking about premium increases that are doubling or, in many cases, tripling, that is not sustainable. So we had a proposal that had its flaws. There were also some provisions in the Republican bill that we know were not going to garner support from across the aisle.

And I guess where I am today--as most Members have left the Chamber, have left the building, they are going back to their States for the weekend--we are leaving with unfinished business, and this is something that we have known was coming for a long time, for a long time. It is not like this just crept up on us. We had a chance to address it in budget reconciliation, but we couldn't agree to do so. We were told: No, no, no. You know, we have got a lot of time on that. We will do it later.

That would have been a win on healthcare. We would have avoided this anxiety that we are in right now. We had a chance to address it, to avoid or end the shutdown. The same story; we weren't able to do that, and so we let the clock run. We wait and we wait and we settle for competing proposals, and now we are where we predicted--where I predicted we would be. We failed in both, and nobody wins from that. Nobody wins from this either politically and certainly not in real life.

As I was coming over here, I asked some of the folks that were with me--and I said: What day is Festivus Day? Festivus, for those who are not familiar, is kind of like the day of grievances, which apparently is December 23, just before Christmas. I am not here to do a preemption of Festivus and just air grievances because I don't think that is what people want us to do here.

I think they want us to try to figure out, OK, you have demonstrated what you can't do. Now, can you demonstrate what you can do? And that is where I want to put us. I refuse to accept that where we are right now, which is two failed bills, is the best that we can do.

I voted to proceed to both proposals, not because they solve the problem, not because they are great policy, but because I think they kind of represented the least bad options available to us at this eleventh hour and because I think we should be talking about it. We should be debating them, amending them, having an opportunity to do so on the floor, and seeing if we can't make some progress there. Sometimes out in the open gets us somewhere--not too often these days. But I will tell you the alternative, which is doing nothing and letting people--really letting people suffer here, I think, is worse.

So, again, today, we showed the country what we can't do, but I wanted to show that there are bipartisan votes in the Senate that are eager, that are anxious for a bipartisan compromise. And I don't think it is too late for that. It is December 11 here. The year is not over. Our session is not over. I agree that we don't have a lot of time, and we know that. But I think we can still come up with something that, again, would give people in this country comfort knowing that my premiums are not going to double and triple in the calendar year 2026.

So that is exactly what I am hoping the Senate is going to do and what I challenge every one of us to focus on before we adjourn this year.

And it is not like we are starting from scratch here. The ingredients for what we are going to need have been out there. We just need to get them all together and figure out how we are going to bake this. I think we know a lot of the work has already been done. We know the general contours of what an agreement could look like.

By my count, there are no fewer than eight plans that are out there. There are probably more than that that we can draw from. You have got the Democratic bill that we saw, which was the 3-year offering. You saw the Cassidy-Crapo effort. Senators Moreno and Collins have a proposal. I have put forward a proposal. Senator Rick Scott has, and Senator Hawley, Senator Marshall, Senator Husted. There is a lot that is out there. And so many have been speaking about this for so long now.

I have put legislation on the table, a 2-year extension of the premium tax credits, to buy us time to avoid this situation. I have also proposed ways to address it in both budget reconciliation and in my frameworks, when we were trying to figure out how we handle the shutdown. So there is not a lot of new stuff out here. We know what the component pieces are.

And it is not just in this body. Look at what is happening down the hall here.

Two--two--bipartisan proposals by Members of the House, and they are circulating for signatures so that they might be able to discharge and be able to move this. To me, I think that is really significant. You have got Members in the House that are coming together, and they are going to stand out and put their name up front on a bipartisan effort. Maybe, it is not everything that they want, but they are willing to put something out there because they believe that the American people demand and deserve a solution.

And so I am encouraged. I am really encouraged by the momentum that we are seeing coming out of the other body as a way out.

And so if you take time to look at the proposals that are out there, you can see where we need to go. You can see where there is overlap. You can see where there are areas that serve as the foundation for an agreement. I think there are so many that agree that we have got to have some extension of an enhanced premium tax credit. Maybe it is not 3 years. Maybe it is. We know it is at least 1 year. Perhaps it is 2 years.

Most agree on the need for reasonable reforms to ensure that these credits are going to go to those who need them most and to protect the taxpayers who foot the bill from the waste, fraud, and abuse, because we know that that is real. We have to address that. We have got some good measures, good ideas on what to do there. They are already written. We can plug them into a bipartisan measure.

And there is consensus for reasonable limits on who can receive the credits and an understanding that reforms need to be made, again, to reduce the fraud in the system.

And I think we can do some of that through some of the program integrity reforms and by addressing plans where the customer is not currently paying any premium whatsoever.

So, again, I acknowledge the great work that Senator Cassidy has put forward with proposing solutions that give families options here when it comes to their healthcare choices.

So here we are on December 11. We have taken the partisan votes, and now we need to move forward. We need to develop a bipartisan product based on what we do agree on. And I firmly believe--I firmly believe-- that it is in our reach, if we try, but to get there in this short period that we have in front of us, we have got to remember that none of us get to design this on our own. None of us will get exactly everything we want. The time for that is over.

We have proven that no specific plan of that nature has the kind of support that we need. So we have got to do better. We have got to do better. We can't just say: Happy holidays. Brace for next year. That is our message to you.

We need to focus on the people who are going to be hurt if we do nothing, and we need to set aside the politics and the partisanship that are preventing us from helping them.

I think there is still a consensus to be had here, and know that I stand at the ready to do everything that I can to help in that effort before we adjourn at the end of this year.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that privileges of the floor be granted to my intern Rachel Shaw for the month of December 2025 in the 119th Congress.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed

in the Congressional Record a letter from the Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation, dated December 3, 2025, expressing strong support for S.J. Res. 91 and H.J. Res. 131, joint resolutions providing for congressional disapproval of the Bureau of Land Management's 2024 Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Leasing Program Record of Decision under the Congressional Review Act.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 15 minutes prior to the scheduled rollcall vote.

Mr. President, I have come to the floor this morning as we begin debate on two identical disapproval resolutions. This is S.J. Res. 91--I filed it with Senator Sullivan--and then H.J. Res. 131, which is a companion measure filed by our delegation colleague Representative Begich. These resolutions would nullify the Biden administration's Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Leasing Program. This was unilaterally rewritten and finalized over our objections back in November of 2024.

We are going to have an opportunity to vote later on a motion to proceed to my Senate resolution. Then, if that succeeds, our final vote tomorrow will be on the House resolution because it can then go directly to the President's desk.

Those of us in the Alaska delegation filed these resolutions because we are again seeking to overturn the Biden administration's effort to effectively shut down resource production across Alaska. We opposed their Central Yukon Resource Management Plan, their integrated activity plan for our National Petroleum Reserve, and their decision to shut down any potential development on a very small part of the Coastal Plain.

So for those who have not followed this, the Coastal Plain is a 1.56 million-acre tract of land. This is on the eastern part of Alaska's North Slope. So if you look at the overlay here of Alaska, across the lower 48 States, the ANWR region is up here in the upper eastern corner. The refuge itself is about 19 million acres. This is approximately the size of South Carolina. The nonwilderness area--this is the 1002 area--is 1.5 million acres, which is approximately the size of Delaware. Again, you see this in that section of the map there.

The Coastal Plain is part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but in designating that as a refuge, Congress specifically reserved this area up at the top, on the slope there, for energy exploration and potential future development. Congress did this through what was known as section 1002 of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. We call it ANILCA. So when we refer to the 1002 area, it is this Coastal Plain here within the ANWR region.

Section 1002 of ANILCA starts with a purpose that explicitly authorizes ``exploratory activity within the coastal plain in a manner that avoids significant adverse effects on the fish and wildlife and other resources.''

So I think it is important that people understand this purpose, this distinction. The 1002 area--this area here, the purple area--is not Federal wilderness. By law--by law--it is a Federal set-aside. This area here is wilderness. This is the refuge area. The 1002 area, again, was specifically set aside to authorize exploratory activity.

Then Congress left the decision on development to be determined later. It was years--it was decades, actually--it was in 2017 that we in Congress agreed as to what should be allowed. I was chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee at the time, and we added a title II to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. It drew bipartisan support, but we effectively put an end to a 40-year battle. We opened up a small fraction of the Coastal Plain to responsible development. And under the terms of that act, we required at least two area-wide lease sales over the course of 7 years.

But we provided balance to all that. It wasn't just ``open the whole thing for exploration.'' We limited surface development to just 2,000 acres.

So, keep in mind, in this area that is the size of Delaware, we limited surface development to 2,000 acres, which is one one-hundredth of 1 percent--one one-hundredth of 1 percent--or one ten-thousandth of all of ANWR. That is what we included within that measure in that 2017 act.

We did not shortcut or truncate the environmental review process. The Department of the Interior effectively spent 3 years designing a sound, environmentally protective program, and the result, then, was a record of decision in August 2020 that would have allowed us to safely develop the area's anticipated resources while fully protecting the fish, the wildlife, and the subsistence uses.

We have talked a lot on this floor and in other areas about the resources that we project to be in the ANWR area--prolific resources-- an estimated 7.7 billion barrels of oil, which would be enough to add a half million barrels a day to our Trans-Alaska Pipeline System for perhaps the next 40 years and help to fill up our pipeline.

I am one who has been engaged in this battle for decades, and I absolutely understand the concern about whether or not limited development makes sense in the area. And like so much of Alaska, the Coastal Plain is a special place. None of us wants to see it harmed, and that is why we went to such extraordinary lengths to ensure that energy development and environmental protection could coexist. We didn't trade one for the other. We didn't put energy above the environment.

We had a lot of confidence in the program that was finalized in 2020, but, unfortunately, we never got the chance to, once again, demonstrate how Alaska leads the world when it comes to balanced, environmentally responsible development.

We held our first lease sale in early 2021, but after that, everything seems to have just kind of gone in reverse, because on his first day in office, President Biden suspended the Coastal Plain Program. His Department of the Interior paused all leasing and development activities before arbitrarily canceling every lease in the area.

And the Biden administration didn't stop there, either. They next decided to rewrite the Coastal Plain Program to make leasing unattractive and development impossible. And they claimed deficiencies in the original process, between 2017 and 2020, that they had to somehow go back and remedy, but they never really cited anything specific. Now, keep in mind, the Biden administration in their political agenda did not include energy from Alaska. So they were trying to move forward and address what they said were flaws, but their process was also fatally flawed.

For starters, the Biden administration failed to meaningfully consult with the people who actually live on the North Slope, including those who live in Kaktovik, which is the only community within ANWR's boundaries. When I say ``failed,'' I mean they refused--they flatout refused. I added report language to my Interior appropriations bill directing them to do the consultation, and still they refused.

The Biden administration issued a record of decision for a new Coastal Plain Program in November of 2024. And if you spend time looking at it, you will understand why we are here, because it clearly and repeatedly contradicts Federal law, because the Tax Cut and Jobs Act opened the 1.56 million-acre Coastal Plain to potential development, subject to the 2,000-acre surface limit.

We were very clear in what that law was. The Biden administration took that, flipped it on its head, and finalized the program that allowed leasing on just 400,000 acres--so, gone, immediately. Gone was potential leasing on 74 percent of the 1002 area. And the 400,000 acres that was left available, which is--I question the availability there-- but it amounted to less than was bid on at the 2021 lease sale. And even there, 231,700 acres were subject to no surface occupancy, another 84,300 were subject to controlled surface use, and 3,100 acres were subject to timing limitation. So only about 5 percent--only about 5 percent--of the overall Coastal Plain was subject to standard

lease terms and conditions under the Biden plan. So think about that-- just 5 percent now.

The Biden administration also restricted seismic surveying--the best way to understand the Coastal Plains resources. They restricted the surveying of the lands that were now theoretically available for leasing. They even reinterpreted the 2,000-acre limit to not be a ``saleable feature'' of leases. We had discussed this with the Parliamentarians during the budget reconciliation back in 2017, but it was a matter of secretarial discretion to allow development of anywhere between 0 and 2,000 acres. So, again, they flipped that on their head.

So it wouldn't surprise you to learn that the 2024 program contemplates development on a maximum of 995 surface acres. Again, what we had statutorily prescribed--what the law says--was 2,000 acres.

Finally, the Biden administration expanded and created new lease stipulations and required operating procedures to further dissuade leasing interests and clamp down on any potential for development. The goal wasn't hard to understand. It is evident in the 2024 record of decision.

Interior acknowledged that, under their preferred alternative, future oil production from the Coastal Plain would decline nearly 80 percent. They knew it. That was the plan. I think they were probably trying to shoot for closer to 100 percent.

Under the 2024 plan, there would be no leasing, as we clearly saw in a lease sale that was designed to fail and then did fail late last year. There would be no development on the Coastal Plain, regardless of congressional action, support from Alaskans who live on the North Slope and within the Coastal Plain, or our national need for responsibly produced energy.

Bear in mind, this is all taking place right as the Biden administration was relaxing sanctions on countries like Iran, like Venezuela, allowing them to produce more and financially benefit from the development. And it also happened right as California, which is a traditional market for Alaska's oil, was importing more oil from the Middle East, which is a long way from California, but also from other countries in South America, actively deforesting the Amazon rain forests. So if you want to talk about a massive geopolitical and environmental failure, that was it--that was it--happening under that administration.

Less oil from Alaska means a Trans-Alaska Pipeline System that is running mostly empty. It means a west coast that increasingly turns to imports instead of domestic energy, regardless of the terror that that breeds or the devastation that it causes.

It also means fewer jobs for hard-working Alaskans, less opportunity in our communities for the folks who support and benefit from energy development, less revenue for the State of Alaska, and, in turn, less infrastructure and services. To me, that just makes no sense.

The people of the North Slope, the Alaska delegation, and the State of Alaska were ignored as the Biden administration put its 2024 program into place. From the start, this was a fait accompli. There was no question in my mind what they planned to do, and there was nothing unfortunately that we were able to do to change their minds.

It really didn't matter what Alaskans wanted. It didn't matter what the law required. It didn't matter that they wound up in court and lost--and lost badly--as they did when a Federal judge ruled that their cancellation of the Coastal Plain leases was blatantly illegal.

All of that was their choice, and this is ours. This is our choice-- to disapprove and permanently nullify their actions so that they never come back in substantially similar form. So if you care about the rule of law, if you care about our domestic energy security or the consequences of sending our dollars abroad for energy that we have here at home, then I would ask you to join us in supporting this resolution.

I think if you acknowledge that no one cares more about Alaska than Alaskans, you should be with the full Alaskan delegation on this. We can restore the rule of law. We can require Federal Agencies to follow congressional direction. We can return to balanced management on the Coastal Plain, while still protecting 99.99 percent of ANWR's surface acreage. I think the choice is pretty clear.

I would urge colleagues to support the motion to proceed later and the underlying resolution when we vote on it tomorrow.

Mr. President, I would ask, as I wrap here, that unanimous consent be provided for letters of support from those who live on the North Slope, as well as letters from the Resource Development Council and the NFIB, to be printed in the Record.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I know that we are getting ready to wrap up the day here, on this Saturday, and I just wanted to take just a couple minutes. And I really don't feel like I am speaking as the Senator for Alaska. I feel like, at this moment, I want to be the Senator speaking for the men and women who allow this place to happen on a weekday but also on a weekend.

There are a lot of really great people who come in, day over day over day, to either protect the Capitol, to clean the Capitol, to help make sure that our operations are efficient and expedient to the extent that we can be. They keep the wheels on the bus, if you will.

And along with all of our other Federal employees and so many that are being impacted by this shutdown, they haven't been paid since the 1st of October, since the shutdown began, and the pressure points are real. I spend a lot of time talking to these people because they are, again, the ones that are making things happen here.

And we are here on a weekend, and I am glad we are here this weekend. I didn't want to be. I didn't want to be here last weekend, but I said: Until the government is open, we should be here doing our jobs.

And so I am glad that we are here, but I also recognize that this is not business as usual. This is not ordinary times. This is a Saturday. It is a beautiful day in Washington, DC, right now.

And we have asked those who are our stenographers, those who are doing the photocopying, those who are outside guarding the doors to this entrance--we have asked everybody to be here. We have asked everybody to be here.

The Capitol Building, the doors that are open this weekend--almost identical to what we would be doing on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. The doorkeepers who are outside, same schedule as usual. The Employee Assistance Program, same schedule as usual. The food services, a little bit pared down, but outside of some different hours, scheduled as usual.

The ID office--do we really need to have the people who work at the Senate ID Office here on a Saturday and a Sunday?

The media galleries, the parking operations, the photographic services--do we really need to have the Senate photographers coming in?

Those people who have kids, whom they don't get to see during the week--we are now asking them to come in, be on standby here during the weekend, drive 45 minutes to come in.

Printing and graphics. We need charts. Well, those folks are all still here.

The Senate Post Office, the Senate recording studio.

I care about the people who allow our operations to function, and I don't want us to grind them down. And so I am asking that our Sergeant at Arms, along with those who have the oversight--it is the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration--I am asking them to take a look at this list and to make sure that we are treating the people who stand by us with the degree of respect that they deserve during a really difficult time.

We need to get the shutdown over, behind us, yesterday. But, in the meantime, let's think about those who are here.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, we will soon have a voice vote on a motion to adjourn the Senate until next week. Had there been a recorded rollcall vote on that motion, I would have been a resounding ``no,'' and I ask to be recorded as a ``no'' based on my strongest opposition to Members leaving town.

This is day 30 of the Federal Government shutdown. Agencies are shuttered. Important services are paused and unavailable. Countless Americans have missed paychecks because of our failure to do our job to keep the government open.

It only gets worse as this drags on.

On November 1, an estimated 42 million Americans will miss out on their monthly benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which are essential for individuals and families across the country, including countless military families in Alaska.

We have seen delays at major airports. People are canceling appointments as they cut back on expenses. Businesses are losing business they count on to keep their doors open.

None of this should be acceptable to us.

At the start of this week, I came to the Floor and asserted that we need to stay here and stay in session until we have reached agreement to re-open the government. I remain convinced of that. Instead of adjourning, we need to lock ourselves in a room and figure this out-- because real people are being needlessly hurt as Members fly out for another long weekend.

Mr. President, I have come to the floor to join my colleague from Alaska Senator Sullivan in support of S.J. Res. 80, as Senator Sullivan explained earlier.

This resolution will disapprove the integrated activity planned by the administration, issued back in 2022, to manage the National Petroleum Reserve in northwest Alaska. He sponsored it and I cosponsored it because the Biden administration imposed this management plan over not only our objections but the objections of leaders from across Alaska's North Slope. The third member of our delegation, Congressman Begich, has introduced H.J. Res. 124, which is identical and is pending in the House of Representatives.

I think it is important to outline a little bit of the history on this issue, but I don't want to go into all of it.

The National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska--we call it NPR-A--is a 23 million-acre tract of land. It is roughly the size of the State of Indiana. It was specifically--specifically--designated for responsible energy development.

The petroleum reserve dates back a century, to President Harding's withdrawal and initial control by the U.S. Navy.

More recently, Congress has come to understand not only the naval value but the national value of the area. They have directed the Department of the Interior to ``conduct an expeditious program of competitive leasing of oil and gas in the Reserve'' to help boost our energy security.

What I just shared there is a word-for-word requirement from existing Federal law, so this is what is in law: ``to conduct an expeditious program of competitive leasing of oil and gas in the Reserve.''

The Department is mandated to do that while protecting important values, including sensitive areas, as well as providing for subsistence use for Alaskans. This is generally Alaskan Natives who live in the North Slope area.

Congress really envisioned this as a balance here, where you had responsible exploration and development moving in tandem with strong environmental protection and subsistence rights. The statute is pretty clear. It kind of spells it out. And we are OK with that. We don't have a problem with that. That is kind of the Alaska way.

But, unfortunately, the Biden administration ignored that. Instead of providing for balanced management, the last administration ignored what I think was a good plan that was already in place. They ignored Federal law. They ignored the congressional delegation. They ignored the people who live on the North Slope. I think they also ignored or overlooked our history of responsible production, our energy security, and they instead prioritized conservation over everything else. So that is why we are here.

The 2022 Integrated Activity Plan cut off access, to cut off leasing, to cut off development in our petroleum reserve. That was not an accident. That was the goal here. That was the intent. The 2022 plan admits--they admit--that it will reduce oil and gas activity, which was fine in the eyes of the Biden administration because, right as they were putting sanctions on Alaska, they were taking them off of places like Iran and Venezuela to free up those nations to produce more.

Let me reiterate how the Biden administration went about doing this. The 2022 plan replaced the 2020 plan, which was put in place after an environmental review process that featured public comment and significant consultation with communities and leaders on the North Slope.

Under that 2020 plan, the BLM concluded that 18.6 million acres--this was 82 percent of the NPR-A--should be open for potential leasing, but in the 2022 plan, just 11.8 million acres--52 percent of the petroleum reserve--were left open for that purpose.

Under the 2020 plan, 4.3 million acres were closed to new infrastructure, with development across millions of additional acres subject to requirements for no surface occupancy, seasonal timing, and other sensible protections, but then the 2022 plan rejected that, closing off 8.3 million acres to any new infrastructure.

The 2020 plan was well received by most Alaskans because it was viewed as balanced. BLM crafted a plan that was, as the Agency wrote at the time, ``suitably specific for broad-scale management decisions. . . . Additional site-specific analysis will occur when BLM receives an application to approve an action on the ground. This will be done through subsequent NEPA reviews and analysis, which will be conducted before BLM issues permits or approvals for any ground disturbing activity.''

In other words, what you had was a high-level management framework. No individual projects were approved. Any seeking to advance would still have to go through a separate permitting process before being allowed to do so.

But unfortunately, BLM abandoned that approach after the Biden administration took office. They didn't base their 2022 plan on any new scientific analysis or new environmental review process; they based it on a political agenda and their preference to what they called ``keep it in the ground.'' They issued a ``determination of NEPA adequacy'' and then went into the 2020 plan and selected a far more restrictive alternative from it.

So with virtually no public process, no public comment, no consultation with Alaska Natives who call the North Slope home, the Biden administration unilaterally cut off access to 6.8 million acres of our petroleum reserve. That is an area that is larger than the individual States of Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Hawaii. It is clearly not what the delegation wanted. It is not what most Alaskans wanted. And, as I explained when discussing the administrative withdrawals in the Central Yukon plan just a few weeks back, it violates multiple Alaska-specific statutes.

I should add that this was just one plank in the Biden administration's plan to shut down development in our petroleum reserve. In addition to cutting off access, they refused to hold a single lease sale in the NPR-A during their time in office. They dragged the Willow Project through years of additional process, sending a signal that nobody else should dare try to develop there. They issued a management rule that turned the law on its head by establishing a presumption against new development. They initiated another process to expand and designate new special areas where no development would be allowed to occur. Then, just a few days before leaving office, an Acting Deputy Secretary issued a memo with interim management measures to further tilt the balance away from any potential development.

So what you had was an administration that wanted nothing to do with responsible development in Alaska's petroleum reserve, and that was enough to cause some whiplash for those of us who not only know the law but also remember the Obama-Biden administration repeatedly urging companies: Go over there. Go to the National Petroleum Reserve.

This was the big fight over ANWR. They said: Don't go to ANWR; go to

I yield the floor.

Madam President, we are in day 27 of a government shutdown--27 days where the government is shut down--and yet we are here. You are presiding. We have pages on the floor. There are people in the Gallery. There are people coming and going. We have Capitol Hill police that are in the area. And it just kind of feels like business as usual. We are going to have committee hearings this week. We are going to be voting on judges and some CRAs. And it just kind of feels like business as usual, and yet it is so not business as usual. We are pretending that everything is OK. We are pretending that people are not being impacted by this shutdown.

I am looking at the people that are here recording this, that will be working to process this Record. None of them are getting paid.

The Capitol Hill police that I visit with on a daily basis outside and inside are not getting paid. And they share with me that: Well, I still had to drive in. I have a 40-minute drive to get here, so I have to fill up my car. I have kids at home that are young kids, and they go to childcare.

This is a Capitol Hill police officer saying this. And he says: So I still have to pay the childcare provider even though I have to come in and I am not getting paid. So my expenses are not going away.

Yet every single one of them says: I am not complaining. I am not complaining. I have signed up for this. This is my mission, and I will be here.

They are proud to be here. But what is wrong is that their families are stressed. I was talking with one Capitol Hill police officer on Thursday of last week, and he says: Every day, I go home and my wife says, ``So, did they open it up? Are we going to be paid?'' And he said: I tell her ``Nope, no progress today.''

So we are starting to feel that, because people who would otherwise just be saying ``I signed up for this. I am not going to complain. I am just going to do what I am going to do''--we are starting to feel this in real time, and it is having an impact not only financially but, I fear, from a mental health perspective.

We had a call come in just--well, actually today. This is a person who was calling from Fairbanks, and she said: It is getting chilly in Fairbanks. I woke up to a bill for heating oil of nearly $2,500. Normally, this wouldn't be that big of a problem for me, but I am a Federal employee. I love my job, but it has been very frustrating to have constant threats of shutdowns and RIFs looming over my head. I work hard. I am so tired of being labeled as one who is not working hard. I would first like to propose that Congress doesn't get paid while we aren't getting paid and maybe take fewer long weekends.

Well, I would let her know that, for many of us--I don't know about the occupant of the Chair, but for many of us, we have deferred our pay. It is not right that our staffs should not get paid and yet we get paid.

But she raises a good point. She says that maybe we in Congress should take fewer long weekends. I think she is right. I think she is right. We left here Thursday afternoon. Members are just now coming back. We will have our first vote here at 5:30.

In the meantime, people have done important stuff. We have important jobs. We go home, we do important things, and maybe we are able to carve out a little time to be with our families as well and try to have some of that balance.

But, for some, they still had to come in this weekend. Some of those Capitol Hill police officers still had to come in this weekend to keep this place moving. Some of the folks who are here to provide services to the building still had to come in this weekend, and they weren't getting paid.

So I think the suggestion about us maybe taking fewer long weekends is something not only that we should consider, but I am going to challenge this body. I have a long commute home, folks, and I am not begrudging that, but I don't think that we should be going home and just behaving as if this was another week in the U.S. Senate--not when we have a government shutdown.

There is so much--so much--that is coming at us like a freight train. Little kids are excited because Friday is going to be Halloween, but let me tell you, the scary costumes on Halloween night are not going to be the scariest things; it is going to be what is delivered, what is left on the doorstep the next morning, November 1, when it then becomes officially official that SNAP payments will not be processed, will not be available for the many, many--66,000 in Alaska--who rely on those food benefits. The WIC payments to the women, infants, and children-- those, too, will be impacted. It is a reality for us that we are seeing an impact across our society in ways that are not only scary but overwhelming for some.

We had a pretty, pretty tough week and a half with a major disaster. Thank you to the President for declaring that Presidential disaster following ex-Typhoon Halong. But I can tell you that those who are reliant on SNAP benefits are increasingly stressed because of what they have just gone through with displacement within their homes. And now it is across the whole State.

Our food banks are stressed. We were stressed going into the beginning of winter already. We keep in close touch with our food banks, and what I am hearing is that we are already seeing the lines at the food banks growing longer. And what is hard to see is to know how many military families are part of those lines now.

Madam President, this is simply--this is simply not right. And we may or may not have what we call rifle-shot votes this week that will-- maybe we will take up again the bill that would pay all the Federal workers. Maybe there will be a way that the military, who has been paid up until the end of this month--that we will be able to make that next pay increment. I certainly hope so. And not just our military but our U.S. Coast Guard and those that are in law enforcement. Maybe there is going to be a vote that would allow us to pay our U.S. Capitol Police. I have signed on to that bipartisan measure. And maybe there is going to be a vote for us to pay out the SNAP benefits. I have signed on to that legislation as well. Maybe but maybe not.

Again, if we do take the rifle-shot approach, who else are we leaving behind? What have we done for the men and women who are making sure that when we go through those airports--the TSA--you have gone through the TSA. What have we done to make sure that our air traffic controllers that are keeping us safe in the skies--that their wives aren't yelling at them at the end of a long, stressful day and saying: When is this going to end?

So we have to figure this out. And I know that we have our positions, and if people don't know what the Republican positions are and the Democrat positions are, they haven't been listening to this discussion for the past 27 days. We know what it is. We have got to come together, which means we have got to talk to one another. And it can't be about Republicans winning and Democrats losing or Democrats winning and Republicans losing because

right now--right now--those that are losing are the American people, those who are calling us up and saying Social Security hasn't released her survivor's benefits after her husband's death. The inquiry is placed on hold. Sorry. You are just going to have to wait.

A fellow in Petersburg was told that his telehealth appointment with his cardiologist was canceled because of the lapse in authorization of telehealth benefits. So they basically said: If you want to keep this appointment, you are going to have to fly to Seattle. Those of you that know Alaska know that Petersburg and Seattle are not connected by a road, and it is not cheap.

A couple in Anchorage said that they have been waiting on an approval from the FDA on a compassionate use exception for a medication to treat stage IV ovarian cancer, and now they are told: Just hold on. Hold on. The government is not operational right now.

We have a lot in our maritime community, and in order for them to be lawfully out on the water, they need to have a license renewed through the new merchant mariner credentialing. That is on hold.

We have a housing situation in Sitka, and we have an Army Corps permit for the housing authority that has been delayed. We can't figure that one out.

We are talking to people who have been trying to get an SBA loan--a local business owner in downtown.

The school district in Sleetmute has been waiting to get the impact aid emergency construction dollars so that they can repair this roof that is literally falling down on top of the kids in the back of the school there.

They are told: Well, there is nobody here to take your call. There is nobody here to take your call because the government is not open.

So for those who think that this is not that big of a deal, they need to start asking people--not only people who are Federal employees, not only people who are SNAP recipients; they need to be asking people about just some of the day-to-day, matter-of-fact things that happen when you have a small business or you are trying to get your fishing vessel out in the water. Real Alaskans are being impacted, and real Alabamans are being impacted.

Americans are being impacted when we don't do our job. And maybe this idea of ``We don't go home this weekend until we resolve this''--maybe it doesn't work. Maybe we just look at one another and say: I am not even going to talk to you. Maybe we just continue on with multiple rounds of the same vote that we have been taking for the past 27 days and see if we get a different result.

Now, some say that is the definition of insanity. I don't know. I don't know. But what I do know is that when we leave and we assume that things are fine or we send that message that things are fine because we have just gone home and it is just business as usual here, then people whose lives are really being impacted right now--they think we don't get it.

We do get it. We need to act to end this shutdown, and I am going to call on all of my colleagues to stay here until we get it done.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I came in at the tail end of the comments from my colleague and my friend from Delaware. He has underscored some points that I think are important to remind us here in the Senate but also people who are watching as we are in day 16 of the government shutdown.

There is no great secret as to how we get the government fully functioning again. It is going to come about through cooperation. It is going to come about through good-faith efforts by good folks who are intentioned to address the matters in front of us.

We deal with politics. This is a political world. But I can tell you that so many of the people who I am talking to don't really care about the politics of our situation. They don't care if the Democrats are winning or the Republicans are winning. They feel like, as Americans, they are the ones who are being caught in this backwash. They don't understand why their flight was delayed or canceled this morning. They don't understand why the individual that they are trying to get through to at an Agency is not picking up the phone or they get a message saying that this office is going to be closed until the government is reopened. What they care about is that we figure it out--that we figure it out. That requires communication. It requires talking with one another.

That is why I appreciate much of what my colleague has shared today, because as we are positioning as two sides that are seemingly dug in on this 16th day of a shutdown, real people are wondering: Is their government going to be there for them?

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

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

Mr. President, we have all talked about what the primary goal is right now in the Senate. It is to reopen the Federal Government, but that is not all we need to reopen right now.

As we focus on ending this shutdown, I have come to speak in support of a disapproval resolution that is now pending. This is H.J. Res. 106. This is the companion to the resolution that Senator Sullivan and I have introduced to reopen the Central Yukon resource management plan after BLM finalized it over our objection last fall.

The formal name of this rule is the Central Yukon Record of Decision and Approved Resource Management Plan. The name is big, and it is a really big area, encompassing nearly 56 million acres, mostly in Northern and Interior Alaska, so the full State of Alaska.

But it is this central area here that is really quite substantial. Not all of that is Federal land. You will see the different colors here. In fact, most of it is not. This RMP is only supposed to affect 13.3 million acres managed by BLM. That is still a lot of land. To put it into perspective, it is more than twice the total acreage of Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, and Vermont. That is what you are looking at here within this region.

We do need an RMP, resource management plan, to guide management of the Central Yukon's Federal acres. This plan is meant to replace older regimes that were put in place back in 1981, 1986, and 1991, as well as some lands that are unplanned. This is a big undertaking. It has been going on for a long time. It started back in 2013, 12 years ago, costing taxpayers millions of dollars to complete.

I didn't want to have to overturn this RMP because I really do respect much of the work that was done--certainly, the people who worked really hard to do it. I also recognize that some Alaskans support pieces of last year's final plan and are concerned that their input could be lost if it is reopened.

But the problem we have here and why we are taking this resolution up today, is that the Biden administration, which was in office during the last few years of this 12-year process, really has left us with no choice here. They lost sight of the need for balanced management. They dropped any pretense of it from the final plan.

So despite objections from me, from Senator Sullivan, the State of Alaska, many Alaskan stakeholders, BLM kind of plowed ahead, and they finalized a plan that overwhelmingly prioritizes conservation but fails to reflect the principle of multiple use, multiple use that is required with our public lands and fails to honor the explicit requirements of a Federal law.

There are some very significant issues within this plan. There are further deficiencies based on what BLM pledged to do and then refused to do. And that combination is what caused us to file this resolution and to seek a more balanced plan going forward.

Let's go through those problems in a little bit greater detail. I expect that one of the things you are going to hear today in opposition is that this is unprecedented; that Congress is now overturning 12 years of nonpolitical, legally sound Agency work. If that were true, I would not be standing here in opposition to this. I would be a no on the resolution, but that is not where we are.

In December of 2020 and BLM's eighth year of work on this RMP, the Agency released a draft plan with a pretty reasonable preferred alternative. This is a proposal that would have protected sensitive areas; it would have upheld subsistence and recreational uses; it would have provided opportunities for resource development and other legal uses on BLM land. Under that proposal, many outdated public land orders--we call them PLOs--would have been lifted, and the majority of BLM lands would have been accessible.

Just a few years later, we saw a very different preferred alternative emerge from BLM. This was in the middle of the Biden administration. The final Record of Decision issued last November is 362 pages long. There are multiple appendices that total another 1,428 pages. It is 1,800 pages. This is the stack of the maps and the pages of the final Record of Decision--1,800 pages showing those various designations and restrictions.

This is in not a user-friendly plan. It is not a printer-friendly plan, that is for sure. But it is also not a BLM employee-friendly plan. It is long and complex. And unless you are really superinvested in learning what was designated as visual resource management class II as opposed to class III or IV, you are probably not really going to enjoy reading it.

The differences between what the BLM proposed in 2020 and what BLM finalized in 2024 show how this process went off the rails. I will give you a couple of examples here. In 2020, BLM proposed one area of critical environmental concern--we call them ACECs--and research natural area. These are administrative withdrawals for conservation and restrict other uses. This covered 77,000 acres.

Then, last year, BLM's final RMP ballooned this to include 21 ACECs and RNAs, covering 3.6 million acres. This is imposing restrictions on nearly 47 times more land.

In 2020, BLM proposed 497,000 acres of special recreation management areas. In 2024, we saw that triple to 1.453 million acres. In 2020, BLM proposed a little over a million acres of utility and transportation corridors. In 2024, that fell by two-thirds to just 33,000 acres.

In 2020, BLM proposed to have almost 7.5 million acres open to fluid mineral leasing. Then, in 2024, it leaves just 845,000 acres, and that is 89 percent

less. So you can see the dramatic differences between the plan in 2020 and the plan in 2024.

There is a lot more I could go through, but the point is that restrictions exploded in the final plan while opportunities for economic development were severely curtailed. We saw it over and over in Alaska over the last 4 years. We don't think it was any accident. You have heard my colleague speak on the floor about this a great deal, but it was just, really, the last administration's goal to reduce and curtail many of these activities. BLM's treatment of public land orders, which have been obsolete in Alaska for decades, also backslid dramatically. These came to be in the 1970s when Alaska's land ownership was greatly unsettled, but they should have been revoked a long time ago.

In 2020, BLM proposed to revoke 5.863 million acres of so-called d-1 withdrawals, but then, in 2024, BLM zeroes that out. Instead, they have only lifted withdrawals for one narrow purpose. It is an important purpose, but it is very narrow, and that is allotments for eligible Alaska Vietnam veterans but no others. In 2020, BLM proposed to lift PLO 5150, reflecting State and Native selections around our Trans- Alaska Pipeline corridor, but then, in 2024, BLM reversed course. It refused to lift a single acre of PLO 5150 within the RMP process.

The problem is that BLM told us--they told me; they told my team-- that they would address PLO 5150 through a separate process. They called it a tiered environmental assessment, and they said that that was going to begin immediately after the finalization of the Central Yukon RMP. They just had to get to that point, and they just needed us to back off so they could. Guess what never happened. The day after the State of Alaska's consistency review period for the Central Yukon RMP ended, BLM canceled its separate process for PLO 5150. It was an absurd decision.

BLM spent years--they spent years--telling us that they could only lift public land orders within the RMP process. And then, as the Central Yukon RMP nears completion, they then tell us that they could only lift one of the most visible PLOs in Alaska outside of it. And then as soon as we reach that point, they break their promise, immediately pulling the whole thing down.

My team was actually on the phone with BLM when this happened. They asked about the process, and they were told everything was on track. Everything was going just fine. Right after--probably not even more than 30 minutes after that--BLM calls State officials to tell them it is off and is never coming back. If that is not a bait and switch, you know, I don't know what is. This is where you can start to see how BLM's actions--both what it did and what it refused to do in this RMP-- directly contradict multiple Federal laws.

The first is ANILCA, the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. That was Alaska's grand bargain. This is where Congress withdrew and conserved tens of millions of acres in our State in exchange for reasonable opportunities for economic development, whether it be within the 1002 Area, the Ambler Road, but this was the deal back in 1980. And to confirm that Alaska had done its part for national conservation, ANILCA also includes several of what we call ``no more'' clauses, reflecting the fact that we were done and that no more wilderness needed to be designated in the State of Alaska.

It should be pretty apparent that the unilateral, administrative designation of 3.6 million acres of ACECs, dozens of other restrictions across millions of other acres, and the retention of virtually all land withdrawals, which were supposed to be lifted decades ago, are all directly contrary to ANILCA.

The Central Yukon plan also conflicts with a law that I wrote called the Alaska Land Transfer Acceleration Act. Some people around here are still surprised that Alaska's land ownership is still not settled yet. Sixty-six years after statehood, neither our State nor our Native land entitlements have been fulfilled. We have got millions of acres remaining outstanding on both of these, and their settlement hinges on the Federal Government making available and then transferring selected lands.

Congress agreed to enact my Alaska Land Transfer Acceleration Act back in 2004. We set this goal that our land entitlements would be complete by 2009. That was the 50th anniversary of statehood. Well, that didn't happen, but some good did come from it. BLM surveyed its land withdrawals in Alaska. Then, in 2006, there was a report to Congress that recommended that 95 percent of them--covering 152 million acres--could be lifted consistent with the protection of the public's interest. The only caveat here was that BLM preferred to lift its orders through its land planning process.

So we worked with them. We pushed to make that happen. We have appropriated funding to make it happen. But when BLM undertakes a new RMP and decides that not a single acre of a single PLO can be lifted across 13.3 million acres for any other purpose other than Native allotments, you are going to see patience run out, and then it turns to frustration; it turns to opposition. Then it takes us to where we are today, which is to the congressional disapproval of a resource management plan.

I would also point out that the Central Yukon RMP conflicts with ANCSA, or the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. The regional ANC in the Central Yukon area, Doyon, has rightly pointed out that BLM's actions in this RMP would make it difficult, if not impossible, to utilize its lands for the benefit of its people in line with congressional intent.

In a letter to Alaska's congressional delegation, Doyon explained how BLM's restrictive land designations will ``complicate access to and use of Doyon lands and potentially prevent Doyon from fully realizing the economic and other benefits that Congress intended it would enjoy as a result of ANCSA's settlement of aboriginal land claims.''

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter be printed in the Congressional Record immediately following my remarks.

We also received a letter of support for this resolution from the North Slope Trilateral, which includes the Inupiat Community of the Arctic Slope, the North Slope Borough, and the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, ASRC. Their letter lays out a series of fundamental flaws within the final Central Yukon plan, including its failure to account for North Slope priorities, the impact that it would have on Native lands, the barriers it creates to cooperative land management, the restrictions it imposes to foreclose the production of rare earth elements and other resources, as well as the lack of consultation with Alaska Natives who live on the North Slope during its development.

As the Trilateral writes, ``The result is a plan that ignores congressional intent under both ANCSA and ANILCA, disregards the economic needs of North Slope communities, and creates unnecessary obstacles to infrastructure, energy, and community health across northern Alaska.''

So, again, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter from the North Slope leaders be printed in the Congressional Record following my remarks.

The sad part is that what these Alaskans are pointing to-- restrictions that encumber access to lands and opportunities--was largely the point of BLM's final RMP, and that again points to why we are here to disapprove this plan.

I should point out that there is a big misunderstanding about the effects of this resolution. There have been some false claims out there, and I think there has been some kind of sloppy reporting of them. But when the House passed this resolution, we saw over and over again in different articles that somehow or other the passage of that resolution had approved the Ambler Access Project, which is not the case. That project has been in permitting for a decade. Then, just on Monday, President Trump issued a determination reapproving it, which we appreciate, but nothing in this disapproval resolution approves that project. So that is just misinformation out there.

What is true is that, over the course of decades, Congress has ceded a lot of authority on Federal land management to the executive branch. We trust them to follow the laws that we have made and find a balance between competing uses and priorities. We know it is not

an easy job, especially in a State where you have more than 223 million Federal acres, but when the Agencies lose sight of that, it is our job here--it is our responsibility--to rein them in.

That is what we are doing. We are reminding BLM that these are public lands that are generally available for multiple use, not exclusively conserved lands with layer after layer of administrative restrictions heaped onto them.

Before I end here, I would like to briefly discuss what comes next if we are able to pass this disapproval resolution.

It should be very clear. Passage does not invalidate 12 years of Agency work. It does not overturn the environmental analysis that has been done or the public comments that have been received. We are simply reopening this plan, and we are telling BLM: Return. Come back with a new one that is more balanced. That shouldn't be hard, and it shouldn't take that long because the plan already exists. It was just abandoned once the Biden administration took office.

For 8 years, BLM was on the right track in this process. It has a readymade plan in the form of its preferred alternative from 2020. The record of decision from last year even acknowledges that the 2020 preferred alternative features a ``blend of resource protection and resource development.'' It is an actual balance between the two, and that is what we should be seeking. It is time to go back to that proposal, update it as needed based on the passage of time, and put into place a final Central Yukon plan that maintains access, respects multiple use, and conserves where necessary and appropriate.

It is entirely possible to serve the varied interests of this region, and through this resolution, that is exactly what we are telling BLM to do. When they do, we will have a final Central Yukon resource management plan that Alaska's delegation, the State of Alaska, the largest landowner in the region--Doyon--and a wide range of Alaska stakeholders can support. So I would urge my colleagues to support this resolution.

I yield the floor to my colleague from Alaska, who has worked very, very hard on this resolution, and I appreciate his leadership of the same.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that privileges of the floor be granted to my congressional fellows and interns for the remainder of this Congress. They are Mary Horton, Kathleen Song, Valerie Hines, and Michael Notti.

I call up my amendment No. 2865.

Mr. President, I have a news alert. This afternoon, we had a 7.3 earthquake off of the coast of Alaska. Pretty big.

We got the alert from KUCB staff members who felt this earthquake out there in Alaska. They contacted the emergency responders. It was an all-hands-on-deck. I am looking at a text I received from the station manager there at KUCB: Three staff members worked at sea level in our studio to get emergency messages on the air in coordination with local public safety officials. A fourth employee worked remotely to update the web and social media. When the tsunami sirens started to glare, the voice message in the warning instructed community members to tune into the local radio. We provided up-to-date information throughout the entire evacuation and all-clear procedures.

So the good news is, tsunami is all clear. They say this is the work we do to keep Alaska safe, and it is only possible with Federal funding.

Mr. President, I have an amendment that protects public media, their independence, their ability to provide local news, weather reports, and, yes, emergency alerts. What we do in this amendment is we tweak the rescission for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to protect public broadcasting while removing the pot of money that can go directly to NPR.

We are reminded today that this stuff matters. I would hope my colleagues would recognize what is at stake and vote for my amendment.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, I know we are approaching the hour that was planned for the vote on this motion to discharge this rescissions package. I just want to take a couple of minutes. I am going to be voting to oppose discharging this package from committee.

It is not that I don't think that we should be doing more when it comes to the oversight of our budget. It is not that I don't think that we should be doing more when it comes to ensuring that we are working to get our levels of spending down, but I also think that we need to be doing more as legislators,

more as lawmakers, more as Senators when it comes to our own authorities, our constitutional authorities, when it comes to the power of the purse.

We do rescissions. We do rescissions in our annual budget bills, in our own appropriations bills--in fact, bills that we are working on right now as appropriators. We have got a series of markups that are going to be coming up this week. We had some last week. We do this. We look to provisions that have been included in the budgets. We look to reprogram, and we look to rescind. We do that as legislators. There is a good reason, I think, that we haven't seen a successful rescissions package before the Senate in almost 33 years. It is because we have recognized that, hey, that is our role here. That is our role here when it comes to the power of the purse.

So I have several concerns, specific concerns, about this package.

First, it is unclear to me how the specific accounts that are targeted for the rescission are going to be impacted. Neither the administration nor others have been able to provide that very clear, very transparent explanation about the programs and the priorities that are going to be cut as a result of the measure. Some changes have been proposed to protect local health programs--that is great; that is important--but I think it is important that we have those details, including the ones that are going to be absolutely zeroed out.

So how do we determine the implications for lifesaving care, for vital resources for women and children abroad?

We have got big, broad categories, but I haven't been given the comfort, if you will, that we are not impacting maternal and child health; that we are not impacting HIV/AIDS; that we are not impacting nutrition programs and programs related to tuberculosis, malaria, polio, neglected tropical disease, pandemic prevention, family planning. I think that we are entitled to have that level of detail when these funds that we have authorized, that we have appropriated, are now being clawed back. I don't think that that is too much to ask.

When it comes to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, my colleagues know I have been a strong supporter, and I will continue to be a strong supporter. If you don't like what is going on within NPR and you think there is too much bias there, we can address that--we can address that--but you don't need to gut the entire Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The entity--the program--that provides for so much support, particularly for those in rural places, is not just your news. It is your tsunami alert; it is your landslide alert; it is your volcano alert; it is the weather to let you know it is safe to go out and get on the fishing grounds; it is your educational programming. I am going to continue to be an advocate for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

So I have got concerns about the contents of the package, yes. I have concerns about the details that we have not been able to fully receive. But more importantly than all of that--more importantly--is our role here. I don't want us to go from one reconciliation bill to a rescissions package to another rescissions package to a reconciliation package to a continuing resolution. We are lawmakers. We should be legislating. What we are getting now is direction from the White House and are being told: This is the priority. We want you to execute on it. We will be back with you with another round.

I don't accept that. I am going to be voting no.

Vote on Motion to Discharge