On the recordFebruary 11, 2024
Madam President, reserving the right to object, anybody who follows the Finance Committee knows that I very much enjoy working with our colleague from North Carolina. We have worked together on a variety of issues here. However, we have got a big disagreement, and I hope we can work it out. More than 90 percent of North Carolina's Members of Congress voted in favor of our bipartisan bill to improve the lives of 16 million kids and assist scores of small businesses trying to better compete with China. This carefully crafted bipartisan bill will significantly also increase the supply of affordable housing, which is badly needed from one end of our Nation to another. If the Senate approves the request of our colleague from North Carolina, it would essentially kick out one of the legs of this carefully crafted bipartisan tax agreement. The entire bill topples. Here is a little background. After 4 months of negotiations, including many meetings over several months and in working with our colleague from Idaho, Senator Crapo; our colleague from Massachusetts, Congressman Neal; Chairman Smith, of the Ways and Means Committee, and I agreed on a bill that brings together Republican and Democratic priorities. Republicans wanted a set of tax cuts for business. Democrats were willing to accept those because many of those tax cuts will help small businesses and help our country compete with China by promoting research and development.…
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