Ron Wyden

The IRS might not be anybody's favorite Federal agency, but the American people do expect it to function without political agenda or interference.

We have had a spirited discussion so far.

If you want big-league infrastructure, a good place to start is not making huge cuts to infrastructure programs that already work.

The administration's infrastructure plan is fiction upon fiction upon fiction.

The famed Mnuchin Rule--the promise that there would be no absolute tax cut for the well-off--that's been shattered in a few trillion little pieces.

The idea that the tax cuts would pay for themselves is far from the only misleading statement about the tax law.

The fiscal bottom line is so far out of whack and the budget so deep in fantasy land.

Revenue, according to the budget projections, is about to plummet: $300 billion short in 2018, $400 billion short in 2019.

Not one request has been honored.

I have repeatedly asked the Treasury Department to turn over to the committee its records on Russian financial transactions in the country.

So it seems to me you are definitely agreeing with the officials who were quoted last weekend.

Cutting back the SALT deduction makes it more difficult for local governments to raise new revenues.

Despite that, the core of the Trump infrastructure plan is for the States and localities to pony up even more money.

Sometimes it reminds me of the marquee at the old movie house where these so-called 'fixes' are supposed to somehow show up and never get there.

We have heard again and again about how there would be fixes to these various problems, and we continue to see that the pass-through loophole which we were told again and again would be fixed still is an ongoing problem.

I am just going to close this round on your so-called compromise on carried interest.

As of now, CEOs have spent 20 times more on corporate buybacks than on boosting employees' compensation.

If you care so much about delivering tax cuts to the middle class, why was it necessary to include in the tax bill a lower top rate for those with incomes over $500,000?

So we were told on the floor of the Senate last December that early this year we would see workers have bulging paychecks.

That means CEOs have spent 20 times more on corporate buybacks than on boosting their employees' compensation.

Since Republicans jammed this massive corporate tax cut through Congress, major corporations have spent over $120 billion on stock buybacks.

The Trump infrastructure plan dumps huge costs onto States and cities, sells off public assets like an auction at a county fair, and raises transportation costs for hard-working families.

I just think we need to be driven by objective facts, and the position you all are taking is out of sync with what all the experts in the field are saying.

If Congress fixes the Forest Service's persistent budgeting issue that results in fire borrowing, my view is that would allow the agency to have more resources available to tackle the very emergencies that we are talking about today.

It has been the longest running battle since the Trojan War to end fire borrowing and this horrible practice that really discourages the prevention that we need.