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Floor Speech

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Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, during the course of tonight's debate, we will be voting on whether to table an item in the amendment lineup in order to submit an amendment that would ban pocket rescissions.

Well, that is a fancy name. What does a pocket rescission mean? It means the President can steal the power of the purse from Congress, which is assigned to Congress in the Constitution, by submitting a proposal to undo spending for a program in the last 45 days of the fiscal year.

And then, because under our rules there is 45 days to consider it, as a grace period, even though Congress never votes affirmatively in support of this proposal, the clock runs out and the funding for the program dies. It is kind of like the clock running out on midnight on Cinderella's stagecoach, and, suddenly, it is a pumpkin.

In this case, it is the funding for some key program in healthcare, in housing, or in education. Or maybe it is an investment in infrastructure. Maybe it is something that creates good-paying jobs. Maybe it is the research that keeps our economy humming far into the future. Maybe it is energy policy. But one person--the President--says he doesn't like that program and decides to kill it by submitting a proposal to kill it in the last 45 days, and the clock runs out before Congress can vote. And then, even without Congress voting, the program dies.

This is an outright violation of the power of the purse assigned in the Constitution to Congress--to us. So we have a bipartisan responsibility to defend our congressional power--our congressional spending power.

Let's consider the difference between a democracy and an authoritarian government. In a democracy, you have folks who are elected from every corner of the country. They come together with their different life experiences. They come together with their different insights. They come together understanding that the needs in one part of the country are different than another. And they create spending programs and spending levels appropriate to address the challenges in every corner of the Nation. That is called a democracy.

Well, what about an authoritarian government? What does that look like? That is one person, a Chief Executive, who issues fiats and kills programs, and says things like: I am ending that grant program because it is not in alignment with my priorities. I am killing that program because it is not in alignment with my priorities.

That is an authoritarian government, and that is what a ``pocket recession'' is--an authoritarian killing programs when the Constitution gives that power to Congress, not the Executive.

So later on, I will ask all of us to stand up and defend our Constitution. I do hope that Members on both sides of the aisle will actually proceed to give that defense to the vision of a democracy, rather than granting authoritarian power to an authoritarian tyrant named Donald Trump.

Thank you, Mr. President.

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