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Floor Speech
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Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam President, you would have to look long and hard to find a Tennessee family who is better off now than they were before Joe Biden became President. By the end of last year, Tennesseans were paying an extra $629 per month just to cover the cost of inflation caused by this spending spree that Biden has been on--a $6 trillion spending spree.
Madam President, it is $629 per month, per family, in Tennessee. I am noticing on my chart that in Hawaii, your monthly inflation costs are $802 per month, for an overall impact of $9,600. That is what this agenda is costing your constituents and my constituents in Tennessee. This is an enormous premium on the bare minimum, and Tennesseans know exactly who is responsible for this.
After 2 years of hearing their stories, I am positive that not one person working in the White House has bothered to leave Washington, DC, and witness for themselves what is happening to American families as they try to work their way through this.
It sure doesn't sound like my Democratic colleagues here in the Senate have been paying much attention to what is happening with families back home because if they had taken the time to put themselves in the shoes of a family who is trying to stretch that paycheck month after month after month, they never would have justified wasting families' money on social justice programs and green energy schemes. And the list goes on and on. Now those families, who have already been drained by Joe Biden's spending, are running out of things to cut in their family budgets. Small businesses are running out of places that they can cut back in their small business while they are trying to keep the doors open.
What we are hearing in Tennessee is this: There is less meat on the dinner table than there was a year ago because it costs almost 9 percent more to buy chicken and beef than just last year. They probably don't have cereal for the kids in the morning because the price of one box of cereal has risen about 16 percent.
Here we are in the dead of winter, and Tennesseans are paying upwards of 15 percent more to keep the heat on in their houses--15 percent more than they paid last year. If the kids lose a coat at school, it is going to cost 3 percent more to get a new one. If it snows, socks and boots are going to come at the same premium.
These percentages are adding up, and right now these families are praying that they will be able to move around money so that they can keep the kids warm, keep them in school, and keep the house dry. These are not things that are luxuries; they are necessities. The impact of inflation is measurable--measurable--to Tennessee families.
Local officials all across Tennessee are feeling a different sort of pain when they confront the effects of inflation. Earlier this month, I spoke about the incredible growth that is happening right now in West Tennessee. Companies like Ford Motor Company are moving in, and they are bringing thousands of jobs with them. Now the pressure is on our county mayors and other local officials to start building out roads and utility services to support these projects.
Officials in these rural counties have worked hard to keep their budgets balanced and their costs down. They, too, have basically done everything right. They balanced their budget. They have a rainy-day fund. Yet they are still struggling to prepare for the future because even a healthy budget can't cover the cost of inflation. Supplies are too expensive. Raw materials are too expensive. Pipe for the water project is up 400 percent. Can't get transformers for utility projects. Can't keep all of the emergency vehicles and the schoolbuses and the county road department--those vehicles running because of the cost of diesel and what it has done.
What we know is that many things are just too expensive to afford. Money for luxuries? No. We have to keep the doors open, the lights on, keep them heated, and keep the buses running.
Everything from electrical equipment to parts for emergency vehicles comes with a big price tag. But there is something that Joe Biden and my Democratic colleagues could do about this. They could do it if they wanted to, if they chose to. It is amazing that they have chosen not to do this.
If the Democrats continue to spend, inflation will continue to rise. Economic growth will stagnate. The debt burden will become so large that future generations will never be able to escape it.
You know that debt burden right now is about $95,000 per U.S. citizen? $95,000. I have a grandchild due this year. When that baby is born, he is going to have his share--$95,000--of our Nation's debt. Per taxpayer, that comes out to about a quarter million dollars. I would say: Is that moral, is it immoral to pass this on to our children and grandchildren?
This debt burden will be very difficult for future generations to escape. And the people who have already lost so much to this Big Government will continue to suffer. For 2 years, the Biden administration has appeared to ignore that type of suffering.
Now, I say ``ignored'' because it would be impossible for them to not know how obvious and unhappy the American people are with this impact of inflation and the cost of living on them every day. A Reuters poll recently released just before President Biden delivered his State of the Union Address shows that 65 percent of Americans think that this country is on the wrong track. A year ago, 58 percent of Americans believed we were on the wrong track. So it is safe to say that not only are they unhappy, they see this downward spiral that Joe Biden and the Democrats have thrown them into. The only way out of this is to get our fiscal house in order. And that does include cutting spending.
Last week, I introduced legislation to cut Federal spending by 1 percent. That is one penny out of every dollar. Every Agency should be able to save a penny out of their budget. And if they can do that 1 penny, maybe they could do 2 pennies; maybe they could do 5 pennies. We could pass those bills this month to cut 1 percent, 2 percent, or 5 percent out of the budget. Putting politics aside, it is going to take making certain that we prioritize fiscal responsibility. The frustration that the American people feel with what has happened in this building on the Democrats' watch doesn't compare to the pain the people in this country feel when they explain to their kids why there is less food in their lunch boxes this week, why there are different food items on the table when they come home every night. But 13-percent food inflation--that is tough. That is tough on families. You couple that with the amount of inflation at the gas pump and life becomes incredibly expensive.
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