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[Pages S3085-S3086]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
DISASTER RELIEF
Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, all week, Chairman Shelby and a number
of our colleagues worked tirelessly to get a supplemental funding
agreement for disaster relief over the finish line. He has prepared one
thoughtful, good-faith compromise after another.
In fact, this has been going on for months now: compromise offer
after compromise offer from Republicans--constant engagement and good-
faith work. So I am pleased that, today, all of this hard work has at
long last paid off. Thanks to the efforts from a number of our
colleagues and thanks to the leadership of President Trump and his
administration--and, I might add, the occupant of the Chair, who has
been extremely persistent in this effort over the last weeks and
months--the Senate has now passed a compromise solution
[[Page S3086]]
for disaster funding, and we have sent it over to the House.
Regretfully, they are gone.
The President has indicated he supports it. So the Senate's
bipartisan vote is a big step toward making law and actually delivering
the relief that communities across our Nation sorely need.
I am sorry that our House Democratic colleagues blocked commonsense
efforts to include funding in this legislation for the ongoing
humanitarian crisis down on the southern border. Despite days of
negotiations, House Democrats insisted that we could not provide more
funding for our overwhelmed agencies, which are running on fumes,
without including other poison-pill policy riders. As a result, today's
agreement omits those needed resources.
This wasn't money for the wall or even law enforcement. It was money
so that the Federal Government can continue to house, feed, and care
for the men, women, and children showing up along our southern border--
money for agencies that are currently, literally, running on fumes.
This is money that is so uncontroversial--so uncontroversial--that
even the New York Times published an editorial titled, ``Congress, Give
Trump His Border Money.''
Even the New York Times blasted the ``political gamesmanship [that]
threatens to hold up desperately needed resources.'' That is what they
called it--political gamesmanship.
Well, I am sorry to say their political gamesmanship did hold up
these resources. Apparently, our House Democratic colleagues heard
``President Trump'' and the word ``border'' in the same sentence and
decided they preferred no action at all to the sensible compromise that
even the New York Times had called for.
It is too bad that partisan spite has infected even such blindingly
obvious priorities as the humanitarian efforts on our own southern
border. I am sorry that our Democratic friends have become so committed
to ``the resistance'' that they are now to the left of the New York
Times editorial board.
Nevertheless, we should celebrate the progress we are making today.
The Senate passage of this legislation marks a huge step forward for
communities across the United States that have gone far too long
without receiving this Federal assistance to help them get back on
their feet.
Finally, the millions of Americans who have grappled with nature's
worst are closer to receiving the supplemental aid they urgently need
for the western communities that are still sorting through the ashes of
last year's record-breaking wildfires; our coastal states in the
Southeast and Puerto Rico, where hurricane damage punched holes in
homes, businesses, and critical infrastructure; the Deep South
communities victimized by tornadoes; and for those still grappling with
the floodwaters that have surged over farms and towns across the
Midwest and in my own State of Kentucky.
So I am grateful and relieved that Chairman Shelby, Senator Leahy,
and colleagues of ours, including Senators Perdue, Isakson, Rick Scott,
Rubio, Ernst, Thune, Blunt, Sasse, and others have brought us to this
point with their tireless work on this subject.
I am grateful to the President for his leadership and focus on
getting an outcome. I am glad we passed this legislation and sent it to
the House. I urge our colleagues over in the House to support it.
____________________
