Barrasso: Mandate to Move to the Middle

Statement

Today, U.S. Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) spoke on the Senate floor about the lack of bipartisanship in President Biden's first 15 days in office.

Excerpts of Senator Barrasso's remarks:

"It is day 15 today of the Biden administration, and on day one, President Biden - he promised to usher in a new era of bipartisanship, he said, and healing.

"Well, within his inaugural address, he said the words with unity, we can do great things. The senator from Oklahoma and I agree with the president and the words that he spoke on inaugural day.

"But here we are just two weeks later, and it seems to me it was all just talk. So far we haven't seen much bipartisanship from the Biden administration.

"President Biden has already issued more than 45 executive actions, and that's more executive actions from the first two weeks than President Trump, Obama, Bush, Clinton in their beginnings in office.

"And it's interesting, because as President Biden was rolling out one executive order after another, even the liberal "New York Times,' which endorsed President Biden, had this lead headline, and this was Thursday, January 28. So this was a full week ago. It says, "Ease up on executive orders.'

"When "The New York Times' has to call President Biden out on executive overreach, you know that President Biden has abandoned the promises that he's made during the campaign and that he made to us on inaugural day.

"To just kind of go into the editorial, they said ease up on executive actions, Joe, they said. They said this is no way to make law. They say these directives are a flawed substitute for legislation.

"That's what we see the Biden administration adopting, a flawed substitute, as they say, for legislation.

"Look, they go on to say, on the campaign trail, President Biden touted the skill, his skills at making compromise, and I saw that when I served with him in the Senate.

"I was on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which he chaired. And he does have a history and a skill at finding compromise. "The New York Times' went on to say President Biden's legacy will depend on his ability to hammer out agreements with Congress. That's why we have three branches of government -- the executive branch, the legislative branch, the judiciary branch.

"All of the branches of government. That's, as they say, the legacy will depend on his ability to hammer out agreements with Congress.

"And the problem isn't just how many executive orders are being issued. As my friend and colleague from Oklahoma said. It's what's in them.

"President Biden has already launched a full-scale attack on American energy. To me, this is the whole Green New Deal dressed up as executive orders.

"In fact, the Congresswoman from Michigan who is part of the squad, has been actually boasting about it. She said the principles and the values in the Green New Deal are in the executive orders by President Biden.

"She went on to say the Green New Deal pushed the president toward a much more aggressive approach. I think her statement is accurate.

"President Biden has already shut down the Keystone pipeline, drew a big target on the back of American energy, and then he pulled the trigger. Killed the Keystone pipeline. Hundreds of American workers have already received pink slips. Thousands more will do so, and that will be soon.

"President Biden banned new oil and gas leases on federal lands. Half of my state is federal land, so we know how this works. If this president also keeps his promise to ban fracking, this could lead to a total of millions of Americans losing jobs over the next couple of years.

"At a time when 10 million Americans are already unemployed, these figures are shocking. Yet Democrats aren't stopping there.

"Last week, the Democrat leader came to the floor, and he urged President Biden to go even further, to do even more, much more that was criticized by "The New York Times.' He said President Biden should declare a national emergency because of climate change.

"Leader Schumer is admitting that this radical environmental agenda doesn't have bipartisan support, doesn't seem to have even presidential support to that level, but that's what Senator Schumer is calling for.

"Apparently, Senator Schumer isn't just wanting to outsource energy jobs. He seems to want to outsource the work of the United States Senate as well.

"That's not what the American people sent us here to do. They didn't send us here to stand by and watch a president go with one executive order after another after another. They sent us here to get things done.

"The truth is despite what Leader Schumer says, there is actually bipartisan support for action on climate change.

"Just over a month ago, the Senate passed a bill called the USE It Act, which I authored with Senator Carper. It came through the Environment and Public Works Committee which I chaired. It was completely bipartisan. Came through the committee unanimously.

"It doesn't cost a single American job. It makes a difference with regard to climate. That's what the American people sent us here to do, to work together to find solutions that work, that don't hurt.

"Unfortunately, it's not the Biden approach. The Biden approach turns out to be more mandates, less energy production, and fewer American jobs.

"Now we see President Biden pushing a $2 trillion spending bill. He says it's to help fight coronavirus.

"We just passed a $900 billion coronavirus relief bill about a month ago, signed into law, and as a result, our economy is actually doing better than expected.

"Now President Biden with his new bill, he wants to send checks, send checks to families making in excess of $250,000 a year, a government check, paid for by taxpayers, added to the national debt. Families making over a quarter of a million dollars a year, getting a check from the government when they never missed a paycheck in the first place.

"He also wants to give added bonuses for people who are out of work on unemployment. People who are out of work on unemployment need that unemployment. But not with the added bonuses to the level that President Biden is pointing to.

"And I hear about it in Wyoming, I heard about it last week. If we pass what President Biden is calling for, the average unemployed American would receive a little less than $800 a week total from the government.

"By their regular unemployment and by the enhanced unemployment. That's equivalent to a job making $40,000 a year. People would in many places be paid more to not go back to work than they could earn if they went back to work.

"So the incentive is to keep them out of work, and at the same time we have help wanted signs up around the state of Wyoming.

"President Biden's proposal also includes billions of dollars in spending unrelated to coronavirus. Completely unrelated. Which is something the American people don't understand.

"They understand we need to fight coronavirus. They understand we need to get people back to work. They understand we need to get kids back to school. But to add extraneous spending unrelated to coronavirus is something Americans don't understand.

"Now, this bill includes a mandate from Washington, D.C., a mandate to the small businesses all around the country, many of them struggling, many of them have a hard time making their payroll, and the Washington mandate is you will double the amount of money that you pay right now if you're paying the current minimum wage.

"Doubling the national minimum wage, a mandate from Washington on small business. Nothing to do with coronavirus, but a lot to do with making it that much harder for the small businesses in the small towns of Wyoming to make their payroll and to stay open.

"Now, it makes common sense, when you take a look at that impact, and even the Congressional Budget Office has looked at it, and they have come to the same conclusion that I have and the people of Wyoming have. It's going to cost jobs.

"The Congressional Budget Office says it will cost 1.3 million jobs across America if President Biden has his way and forces a doubling of the minimum wage on small businesses in America.

"Now, in exchange for that federal mandate, the bill pays off states, big cities, blue states, with a long history of bad behavior, to the tune of $350 billion. Studies from J.P. Morgan just came out, and the study shows that state tax revenues barely dropped at all in 2020 as a result of coronavirus, dropped less than 1%.

"These states do not need $350 billion of additional federal support. The state needs a bailout, it's not because of coronavirus. It's because of a long history of mismanagement.

"The Biden administration made this proposal without any meaningful discussions with Republicans at all. And the administration is even ignoring the Democrats.

"Vice President Harris recently went on television in west Virginia and in Arizona, why? Not to put pressure on Republicans, to put pressure on Democrats.

"A big story in "The New York Times' today, putting pressure on the two new senators, Senator Sinema and the senator from Arizona, Senator Kelly, the newest elected senator from Arizona, put on them to vote for the bill.

"She also went in West Virginia, with Senator Manchin. Not only are they not talking to Republicans, now they are trying to pressure Democrats.

"Let's face it. The Democrats are trying to cram this bill through Congress. It's what they are going to do with the vote-a-rama this week.

"On Friday, there was an article in "The Washington Post.' The headline is this - Biden Democrats prepare to move beyond efforts to rule Republicans. I have to ask, what efforts? They haven't reached out in any serious way.

"As some of my colleagues have said, we've proven we can work together on coronavirus relief. We did it five times in the last year. We passed five different coronavirus relief bills. And the total was $4 trillion.

"The article in the Post goes on and quotes Leader Schumer. He says we must not repeat the mistakes of 2008 and 2009. He's referring to the fiscal crisis back then. That response was then led by then Vice President Joe Biden. Yeah, there were plenty of mistakes. Leader Schumer seems to think that the mistake was that it was too bipartisan, and that's the wrong lesson.

"The mistake Congress made under Vice President Biden in 2009 was to spend huge sums of money, completely unrelated to solving the underlying problem, yet that's what the Democrats seem to want to do once again.

"The last time the Democrats did that, we had the slowest recovery since the Great Depression. Do you know what got us out of that slow recovery? American energy, which President Biden is now trying to kill. There are a lot of lessons to be learned here.

"So on Monday, ten Republican senators went to the White House and made their own proposal on coronavirus relief. I really do hope the president listened, because two weeks into this administration, the president's inaugural address is not something that's going to be remembered like John Kennedy's inaugural address was in 1960.

"This inaugural address is going to be remembered for empty rhetoric. President Biden has been trying to govern using a pen and a phone, remember that from the Obama administration.

"I would say to President Biden: time to put down the pen and pick up the phone.

"A Democrat politician famously said that politicians campaign in poetry and govern in prose.
President Biden campaigned in moderation, but that's not the way he's governing. He's governing in partisanship.

"It's not what the American people are asking for. It's not what they voted for. We have a 50-50 Senate. Democrats have a very narrow majority in the House. I would urge the administration to change course. If there is a mandate, it's a mandate to move to the middle.

"I urge my Democrat colleagues to work with us on real coronavirus relief, on producing more American energy, and in creating more jobs across our country. Let us come together and get things done."

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