Thank you very much, Mr. President. I thank my colleague, the terrific chair of the Budget Committee, who has worked so hard in putting together the budget. I wish to speak for a moment on the amendment I will be offering in a few moments…

I look forward to colleagues who will be joining me to express strong support for the budget that has been reported out of the Senate Budget Committee. I first want to thank our chair, who has done a yeoman's job in putting this together…

Did I hear correctly that the Republican budget would give an average of $400,000 in additional tax cuts?

both Democratic U.S. Senators, Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow

I thank the Senator from Rhode Island again for his comments, his leadership, his advocacy for our military men and women and our veterans, and for the economy, for people who need help. As he said, there are a lot of people on the edge…

I would simply, first of all, again thank our chair, who understands and gets this, not only about how to grow the economy and the middle class and in a commonsense way to balance the budget, but she has been such a leader on veterans…

I thank my colleague, the distinguished Senator from Rhode Island. When I think of him, I think of his advocacy for our men and women who make up our troops--and I know our budget chair as well-- and his strong leadership on veterans…

I believe we have other colleagues coming as well. We were hoping to have 30 minutes and possibly more.

I rise today in celebration of my staff member, Melissa Dore, who is retiring after working with me throughout most of my years in the U.S. Senate. Melissa started as a staff member in my East Lansing office and immediately impressed us…

I cannot stress strongly enough the concerns that I have and that others have as well.

There is a letter that has been sent to the administration, signed by Senator Brown and I, Senator Schumer, Senator Casey, that relates to Japan.

I want to thank you for your words and your continued support of TAA as well, as part of the important balance for workers in this country.

I cannot imagine why we would want to proceed with a 1-sided agreement as it relates to American manufacturing in the automobile industry.

This is very serious. It is the number-one issue that our American automobile industry is concerned about.

But it has been 80 years. I appreciate very much the reasons, strategic reasons, for wanting to include Japan, but we cannot allow them to have more access to our market without also having access to their market in the major area in which…

as I rise to talk about the budget that was released in the House of Representatives, I want to first commend our chair Senator Mikulski and ranking member Senator Shelby for working together. I could not agree more with what Senator…

this year marks 65 years since the State of Israel was born, and I wish to speak today about the importance of that occasion and the celebration that will take place in communities all across the world. Our country has a deep friendship…

We have more to do, but it is certainly optimistic right now as we get started in this.

We have tackled it as we have looked at health reform. We have actually begun to see health care costs slow, which is good.

How much of the total deficit reduction since 2011 will be in cuts to services to middle-class families as opposed to asking those at the top to do a little bit more?

That is the kind of thing we should be doing.

We do not want to be a country where health care is based on your income.

In Michigan, our Governor has supported expanding Medicaid because the recent estimates in Michigan show that we will save about $351 million over 10 years by getting people out of emergency rooms.

We have a group of excellent panelists today, and I am going to ask that members' opening statements be submitted for the record.

we can expect conditions that could be even worse this year