Political Quotes

“I thank my dear friend for yielding to me and for his leadership. Mr. Speaker, when I served in local government, I helped write and pass 14 consecutive budgets--all balanced. And what the budget writing process taught me was that a budget is a values document. So what does the budget reconciliation process tell us about our respective values? Well, the last two times the budget reconciliation process was used by Republicans, they used it on a $2 trillion tax giveaway to the wealthiest Americans and corporations and to take away healthcare for more than 20 million Americans. That was their value. The budget we are debating today shows the Democrats in Congress are going to use every bit of a fight we have in us to take decisive and comprehensive action to finally end this pandemic and alleviate the economic pain Americans are experiencing. We will not wait and see if another 100,000 Americans die in a single month in order to deliver vaccines and testing that we need. We will not wait and see if the United States loses another 20 million jobs, or if the American economy experiences another record-breaking year of GDP contraction. We will not wait and see if the U.S. loses another 10 million jobs, or people continue to go hungry at record numbers. We will enact an American rescue plan that saves lives and livelihoods. Those are our values.”