00:00Thank you Mr. President. What the chair has just said is we have, there is a rescission package which has been sent to us by the administration. It is in the committee now.
00:15The next vote would discharge us, discharge the committee, and bring that rescission package to the floor. And at that point, if I'm not mistaken, we would then have another vote to proceed to that bill. Is that correct Mr. President?
00:32That is correct.
00:33All right. I don't want to leave my colleagues in suspense. I intend to vote for the motion to discharge after much contemplation and to vote then to proceed to the bill.
00:53And I do so with reservation. First of all, I applaud the administration for asking for rescission of $9 billion in unnecessary spending.
01:08And I've made the statement I would vote for a bill that was twice that size and even larger. I think we can find that much waste.
01:18But this is an unusual procedure. It hasn't been done by the Senate and the House. It hasn't been successfully done by an administration since the George W. Bush administration in 1992.
01:38$9 billion is a tiny fraction of what we spend. No question about it. A fraction of a fraction, actually.
01:45But there is a big difference that has troubled me, Mr. President, and it's the reason I come to the floor tonight expressing concern in spite of the fact that I will vote in the affirmative on these two motions tonight.
02:02When George W. Bush proposed rescissions back in 1992, he listed specific programs that would receive specific amounts of cuts.
02:17And it was a rather thick proposal, but members on both sides of the aisle in both houses had exact information about what programs would be targeted and where the cuts would be made and by what amount.
02:34That is not present in the proposal before us tonight.
02:39And that troubles me because it concerns me as perhaps approaching a disregard for the constitutional responsibilities of the legislative branch under Article I.
03:02Congress has the power of Congress.
03:04Congress has the power of the purse.
03:06The president has the power to enforce.
03:09In this situation, there's a specific amount stated that will be rescinded, and then basically we're given a number of areas where the cuts will come from.
03:24But this Congress will not be allowed to choose those specific cuts.
03:30That will be done by somebody in the Office of Management and Budget in the White House, and in this situation it will amount to the House and Senate basically saying we cede that decision voluntarily to the executive branch.
03:50And so I have expressed concern about this, and in meetings that I have been in attendance with, with our team on this Republican side of the aisle, I'm not the only one who has expressed those concerns.
04:07There are members of my party who will vote no tonight, I think a relatively small number, and I don't fault them for voting no.
04:19There are also members who are very concerned, as I am, about this process and who are requesting of the administration, if we do this again, please give us specific information about where the cuts will come.
04:34Let's not make a habit of this, let's not consider this a precedent.
04:39But if you come back to us again, Mr. Director of the OMB, if you come back to us again from the executive branch, give us the specific amounts and the specific programs that will be cut.
04:52And that has been my concern.
04:55Nevertheless, Mr. President, I choose to be mindful of those concerns, but to answer to a larger imperative at this moment, and that is to realize that we're in a budget crisis.
05:13And that we have unsustainable national debt, and that we have unsustainable national debt, and the amount of this bill is a small step toward addressing that.
05:25And so at this moment, I think that imperative outweighs my concerns about the lack of information that this Senate and our brothers and sisters in the House have about where the cuts will be made.
05:42I hope in conversations with the executive branch today, I hope in conversations over lunch between the OMB director and members of the Republican Senate caucus, that the point has been made, next time, give us the specific information.
06:05And so I come tonight to express to my colleagues the reason that I have been so concerned about this, the reason that I understand why some of my colleagues will choose to vote no.
06:23But realizing that we are about something larger, and in this instance, I think the message that we send to our fellow countrymen, to our colleagues in the House, and yes to the executive branch, is that the need for the cut in $9 billion overrides the specific objections that I have.
06:50And for that reason, I will vote yes.
06:53I expect the first motion to pass, and then we will proceed on.
06:57And perhaps, for the information of our staff and our pages, we may be here late tomorrow night.
07:05But I appreciate the opportunity, Mr. President, to explain my concerns and my reason for overcoming those concerns in this instance, and I yield the floor.
