ICYMI: Senator Murray on Release of CR Text
***WATCH: Senator Murray’s full speech***
Washington, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, spoke on the Senate floor ahead of the first procedural vote on the bipartisan continuing resolution (CR) released on Sunday, which extends government funding through December 11.
Senator Murray’s remarks, as delivered, are below:
“M. President, we have our work cut out for us as we work to fund the government for the coming fiscal year.
“As costs for our families go up and up and up, the president wants a $1.5 trillion war budget, and he wants to cut programs working people depend on to pay for it. No, no way.
“And as his disastrous war with Iran rages on, Trump is even asking for another $70 billion on top of that to bankroll the war. It is really hard to imagine more backward funding priorities—especially as so many families are struggling and being hurt by Republicans’ cuts to health care and food aid.
“Congress is not an ATM to fund Trump’s disastrous wars abroad. So, as I’ve said many times, we need to rip up the president’s budget and write an entirely new one.
“I’ve been clear from the very start that we absolutely must prioritize helping families and lowering costs as we do that. That means rejecting the president’s astronomical defense request and instead delivering significantly more funding for our nondefense budget, so that we can invest in helping people here at home.
“Now, it’s clear that we will definitely need more time to get this done and reach bipartisan agreement on funding levels—just as we have done in the Senate over the last three years—which then allows us to draft bipartisan bills for FY27.
“So, I am glad we were able to craft a bipartisan CR to keep the government funded and to make sure we can avert a shutdown that no one wants—while giving us time to reach bipartisan agreement on a topline and our funding bills.
“Two weeks ago, House Republicans sent us an incomplete CR with several major issues. It was critical that we addressed those issues in any CR—and that’s exactly what we have done.
“Perhaps most important, we closed a loophole in House Republicans’ CR that would have allowed the Trump administration to transfer funding provided for other programs to Border Patrol. That was a nonstarter. Until Republicans finally agree to enact desperately-needed reforms to ICE and Border Patrol, we cannot approve another cent for them.
“This new CR that we have written includes some really important extensions and language that House Republicans did not. That includes extensions of authorizations for important health, veterans, and infrastructure programs. And language to make sure that key housing programs and a program to help feed low-income seniors can continue serving Americans.
“This bill also rejects requests from President Trump for even more flexibility and funding for the Pentagon, including a billion dollars for ‘Trump-class’ battleships.
“And my Democratic colleagues and I pushed very hard and secured an important provision to prevent the Office of Management and Budget from implementing its corrupt new grants rule, which would require a Trump political appointee to sign off on every last federal grant and empower them to terminate any grant, at any point for any reason. This disastrous rule would put politics above science when determining, for example, what cancer research grants to fund. So, I am going to keep working to kill the [rule] outright as spending talks continue later this year.
“Unfortunately, Republicans would not take action in this bill to protect our constitutional power of the purse and prevent Russ Vought from attempting another illegal pocket rescission. Nor would they agree to our efforts to extend critical advanced appropriations for infrastructure, which were provided by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law—that runs out on October 1.
“Make no mistake: I am going to keep fighting to get these common-sense priorities done in negotiations this fall. We do have a lot of work ahead, and this CR provides us a reasonable runway to get it done.
“I hope this CR sets us up to roll up our sleeves and focus on getting to a bipartisan topline, so we can then write good, bipartisan spending bills.
“So, for all those reasons, I will be voting yes tonight to advance this bipartisan bill.”
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