Sen. Cruz on the Senate Floor: ‘Why are We Bankrupting Our Kids and Grandkids?’

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) today delivered remarks on the Senate floor calling out Democrats for using their self-made debt ceiling crisis as a political pawn to avoid taking accountability for more reckless, out of control spending that will bankrupt the next generation. Read excerpts of his remarks below.

“I rise to speak for the generations of Americans who this body is irresponsibly drowning in debt. Now, to be clear, debt is a bipartisan problem. That is a problem both parties bear substantial responsibility for.”

[…]

“I would note, last year was an extraordinary year with a pandemic, unlike anything any of us have ever seen in our lives. I wish Republicans had been better at exercising fiscal responsibility when we had control of the White House, and both houses of Congress. The unfortunate reality in this body, though, is that when you have a multi-trillion dollar spending bill, you can usually count on the votes of every single Democrat, and about half the Republicans. And so on spending bill after spending bill, we see 75 to 80 senators coming together, usually all the Democrats and half the Republicans. And there are about 20 of us who tried to say, ‘Why are we bankrupting our kids and grandkids?”

[…]

“Let’s put 9.5 trillion in context. $9.5 trillion is more than twice what the United States spent to win World War II. The entire course of the war, it costs us less than half of that to save the free world to defeat the Nazis, and Washington Democrats are trying to spend that in 12 months. It is wildly irresponsible. It is reckless. They’re trying to accompany that with trillions of dollars of new taxes. If the Democrats get their way, every tax you can think of is going up: individual income tax is going up. Corporate taxes are going up. Small business taxes are going up. Capital gains taxes are going up. The death tax is going up. Farmers are paying more in taxes, ranchers are paying more in taxes, small businesses are paying more in taxes, working families are paying more in taxes. Joe Biden’s campaign promised no one who makes $400,000 a year or less will see their taxes go up. That statement was a flat-out falsehood.”

[…]

“Take the Joint Committee on Taxation’s word for that, analyze the Democrats tax program, and found for roughly 80 percent of Americans taxes either stayed the same or go up. That it’s cutting taxes for a very small portion of Americans, it’s raising taxes on people with incomes as low as $40,000 a year.”

[…]

“Inflation is a cruel tax. It’s a tax on everybody. But it’s particularly cruel on the most vulnerable, you know, who get hammered with inflation. Senior citizens, seniors who spent their whole lives saving, they suddenly see the values of their savings going down and down and down because Washington politicians are devaluing their money. Seniors who are on a fixed income, get the same amount of money each month. But suddenly, the cost of everything goes up. Right now today, all across this country in Texas and Virginia and in every other state, prices are going up. The cost of gasoline has skyrocketed as a direct result of Joe Biden and the Democrats’ policies. The cost of food is going up, the cost of rent is going up. The cost of lumber is going up. The cost of homes is going up. According to the chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, for households earning the U.S. median annual income, which is about $70,000 a year, the current inflation rate has forced them to spend another $175 a month in food, fuel, and housing. That works out to $2,100 a year. So each month if your family is at the median income level in the United States, the democrat inflation tax is about 175 bucks a month.”

[…] 

“Yet Democrats want to add trillions more to that. How many trillions? We don’t know; they’re battling within their conference? Just how many trillions more to saddle this country, but it’s going to be a lot. But you know, the curious thing. This crisis is 100 percent, manufactured by Democrats. Why is that? Because for the entirety of this Congress, Democrats have had complete 100 percent power to raise the debt ceiling anytime they want it. How is that? Well, ordinarily, in this body, the way legislation moves, it needs 60 votes to move. It’s called the legislative filibuster. But there’s an exception to that. It’s a big exception. It’s called budget reconciliation. It comes from the Budget Act of 1974. under budget reconciliation, you only need 50 votes, not 60 votes; it’s the biggest exception that exists to the filibuster rule. Democrats, unfortunately, have 50 votes in this body, they have a majority in the House, and they have the White House. That means Democrats using budget reconciliation, and it is clear by the way that you can raise the debt ceiling using budget reconciliation. Democrats could have raised the debt ceiling in January. They didn’t. They could raise the debt ceiling in February. They didn’t; they could have raised it in March, or April, or May, or June, July, August, September. They didn’t. Were in October, Democrats could have raised the debt ceiling today. They didn’t. They could have done it with only Democratic votes. And there was not a single thing Republicans could have done to stop them. They know that. They don’t dispute that. So why are we facing a crisis? If for 10 months, Democrats could have done this anytime they wanted. Why didn’t they? Well, because there are at least some Democrats who realize drowning the nation in debt and spending in taxes is not popular back home. The voters don’t like it.”

[…]

“Now, I believe the end result of this game of chicken was clear that Democratic Leader Schumer was on a path to surrender was on a path to doing what he should have done a week ago or two weeks ago, or three weeks ago, or a month ago or two months ago, which is moving a reconciliation bill and raising the debt ceiling. And I can tell you; there were Democratic senators, multiple Democratic senators coming to me and coming out of the members of my party, saying, ‘Okay, how much time would it take to move a reconciliation bill? Can we get it done in time for the October 18 date that the treasury secretary is laid out?’ And to a person, Republicans answered, ‘Yes, there’s plenty of time. Under the rules of reconciliation to move forward, there’s no barrier you have all the time you need.’ I believe Democratic Leader Schumer was on the verge of surrendering. And then, unfortunately, yesterday, Republicans blinked. I think that was a mistake. I think that was the wrong decision.”

[…]

“If the Democratic senators who give speeches about how bad a default would be if they actually believe that we could come together today. And we could ensure the citizens of Texas citizens of Virginia, the citizens of Utah, that there will never ever, ever be a default of our debt. But if we did that, it would mean that Senator Schumer and Nancy Pelosi and President Biden couldn’t engage in the kind of theatrical, the kind of reckless brinksmanship that we’ve seen over the last several weeks that would jeopardize their radical agenda. I hope and pray that this body, the Senate, serves as the last Bulwark to stop the radical socialist agenda that Washington Democrats are trying to ramp through.”

###