Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I thank my friend the Senator from West Virginia who is standing here--we are standing here together--with a bipartisan plea to the Senate to act in a reasonable, fiscally responsible way. Senator Manchin and I are also, in a bipartisan way, asking the Senate: Don't sell seniors down the river. Look, we all know the U.S. Congress spends like drunken sailors. And, frankly, that is not fair to the sailors because at least they are spending their own money. But even in that context, what we saw earlier today was tragic. The vote earlier today was designed to solve a real problem: the windfall elimination provision, the WEP provision. It was enacted in an effort to ensure Social Security benefits are paid fairly, and they recognized the amount that is actually paid into Social Security. However, when the WEP was enacted, it got the formula wrong, and the result is, for thousands upon thousands of retired police officers and retired firefighters and retired teachers, they got shortchanged. A very significant number of those cops and firefighters and teachers are in my home State of Texas. I have heard from countless firefighters and cops and teachers who have raised that issue. Since 2017, I have been fighting to fix the WEP problem. In 2017, I introduced legislation to fix the inequity and to treat our retired cops and firefighters and teachers fairly.…”