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Floor Speech
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Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, millions of Americans are counting on Democrats to stop Donald Trump and Republicans from raising healthcare costs.
I am here to say: Democrats will not back down. Fighting to lower healthcare costs is a righteous fight.
For too many Americans, healthcare premiums are going up by hundreds or even thousands of dollars a month. Who has that kind of money?
Just this week, I talked to a woman in Florida, practically in Donald Trump's backyard. She is a wife, she is a mother of four lively kids, and she is about to lose her health insurance because of Trump's cuts.
What does that mean for her? She has malignant melanoma, and now she is looking at canceling her ongoing treatments because, once she loses her insurance, she cannot afford treatment for her cancer. That is deeply, deeply wrong.
Democrats are in this fight for the right reasons, and Democrats will stay in this fight for the right reasons.
In July, congressional Republicans worked hand in hand with President Trump on their biggest passion project--jamming through a bill to hand out massive tax cuts to millionaires, billionaires, and giant corporations. Then, just to put a little extra whip cream on top of their Republican ice cream sundae, they paid for those billionaire tax cuts by slashing healthcare coverage for millions of Americans. Every single Republican voted for it, and every single Democrat voted against it.
When the Republicans voted to cut healthcare funding last July, Democrats said: We cannot sign off on a 2026 budget that cuts healthcare for millions of Americans.
On September 30, the 2025 budget expired, and Democrats were ready to negotiate to get some of those healthcare cuts reversed in the 2026 budget, but the Republicans didn't want to negotiate. Nope. The Republicans decided they would rather shut down government than offer a single nickel to help Americans manage healthcare costs. They told Democrats to vote for the Republicans' spending bill--take it or leave it--and they have repeated their ``take it or leave it'' through 15 votes and 38 days.
Democrats have asked over and over and over and over to negotiate to help Americans with their healthcare costs, but Donald Trump and the Republicans have flatly refused to even talk to Democrats to try to get the government back open. Not even once have the Republicans been willing to negotiate--not once.
So where are we now?
Well, Trump tweeted seven times in one day about his brandnew, marbled bathroom at the White House while Americans have turned to crowdfunding to pay for their healthcare and grocery bills.
Trump hosted a ``Great Gatsby''-themed party while he turned off food assistance for millions of Americans. Do you know the message to 42 million Americans from Donald Trump? Eat dirt.
And Trump is weighing the important idea of etching corporations' names into his grand, new, gold-encrusted ballroom while millions of Americans who will lose their health insurance will get sick and be forced to decide whether to give up care altogether or go bankrupt in trying to pay for it.
Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are in disarray. The House is now in its seventh week of a paid vacation. They couldn't reopen the government if they wanted to because they aren't even in Washington to vote. They have Members--Republican and Democratic Members--who want a deal on healthcare, but Speaker Johnson just says: No. Everyone spend another week on a paid vacation.
Here on the Senate side, Republicans are in chaos. Leader Thune puts the same bill up over and over for the same votes, but he won't talk about changing a single word. Now he can't even organize a vote among Republicans to reorganize the government. Instead, Republicans are fighting with Republicans over what to do, and still no one says: Let's help families on healthcare and get the government open.
So Democrats have put a proposal on the table: Lower costs by extending health tax credits for 1 year, and reopen government. Do it all in one vote, and during this next year, we will continue to work to make our healthcare system work better. It is a commonsense plan that helps people across this country, and that gets our government open. The Senate could do its part to reopen the government in less than an hour. We could do it right now, this afternoon. We just have to put the interests of the American people ahead of politics.
Americans are demanding, urging, begging Congress to do something--to do something before Americans are forced to get sicker and sicker before they can get healthcare, to do something before healthcare costs go up and up and up for everyone in this country.
People are sick of Washington politics. So we ask our Republican colleagues: Help us do what is right for the American people and help us do it right now.
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