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Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, as the whole world knows, yesterday evening President Trump gave his State of the Union Address. It is one of our country's finest traditions that the President personally gives an update to the American people on what he has done over the last year, before a joint session of Congress, and what he intends to do in the future. It was an exciting night, with Members of the House, Senate, and the Supreme Court gathered, along with our military leadership, to hear about the impressive year that we have had under President Trump here in the Congress and, of course, at the White House.

And as we just heard from our friends from Wyoming, we had an appearance from the U.S.A.'s men's hockey team, who recently won the gold medal at the Olympics. And the President recognized, appropriately so, so many of our Nation's heroes in a tremendous display of patriotism that, I know, I welcomed.

Unfortunately, many of our Democratic colleagues disgracefully chose to boycott the President's Address. But their collective temper tantrum couldn't stop the rest of us from enjoying the President's speech.

I was honored to have as my guest the president of the National Border Patrol Council, Paul Perez, who has worked for 29 years in the U.S. Border Patrol and who has done a magnificent job leading that organization of incredible patriots, when Democrats have demonized law enforcement across the country, starting with defunding the police, abolishing ICE, and, of course, then the disrespectful way that President Biden's administration treated all of our professional law enforcement officers whose job it was to secure the border.

As we heard last night, President Trump has many achievements that we can all be very proud of, from securing the border from the massive surge of illegal immigration our country experienced during the Biden administration to reestablishing America's credibility on the world stage. But one of the accomplishments that I would like to highlight today is the improvement in our Nation's fiscal situation through the Working Families Tax Cut Act and the work of Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought.

Now, this may be the first speech on the Senate floor in a long time that has praised Russ Vought, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, but I think praise is due, as you will hear in a moment.

Through the Working Families Tax Cut Act, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, we were able to extend and make permanent many parts of President Trump's 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Unfortunately, no Democrat voted to protect the American people from a massive tax increase. It took exclusively Republican votes to do that. We prevented more than a $4 million tax increase on the American people and saved my constituents in Texas an average of $3,000.

Now, people want to talk about affordability. Allowing a $3,000 tax increase to go into effect by effectively voting against this bill certainly does nothing to make affordability better. It makes it worse. But Republicans stepped forward where Democrats would not, in order to answer the call and respond to the needs of our constituents.

We helped working families by increasing the child tax credit to $2,200, and indexing it to inflation, so people who have children and who have the additional expense associated with that will have some relief, have some money, to basically pay for their necessities of life.

And we strengthened the paid family and medical leave and employer- provided childcare credit. One of the things I hear the most from working moms is the difficulty of finding affordable childcare. We responded, by the paid family and medical leave and employer-provided childcare credits, by incentivizing employers to provide childcare to their employees, allowing working moms the peace of mind and the convenience of having childcare for their children.

And we delivered historic relief to hourly wage workers, as well, like folks who work in restaurants. I think most of us--I know I did when I first started out. I waited on tables at a Steak and Ale restaurant in San Antonio, TX. And I know from talking to a lot of young people who are just starting out, as I did at that point in my life, that they are welcoming the fact that now they don't have to pay taxes on income from tips up to $25,000.

But it doesn't just affect people who wait on tables in restaurants. Hair stylists and anyone who receives tips as part of their compensation will benefit.

And then there is no tax on overtime. You know, many of our law enforcement personnel work more than 40 hours a week because, frankly, they don't get paid sufficiently by just working a 40-hour week. So many of them work overtime, and they are not alone. But by saying no tax on overtime, we not only provide American businesses the workforce that they need, but we also reward people who are willing to continue to work hard and provide for their families, to make sure they can keep more of their hard-earned money.

No tax on tips, no tax on overtime.

Of course, in addition to these, there are many other savings for the American people. President Trump made significant strides in getting our fiscal house in order by starting to rein in runaway government spending. Our national debt currently sits at about $38 trillion, and I know that number boggles the mind. None of us can really adequately conceive of how much that is. But here is one indication: We spend more money on interest on the national debt than we do on defense, which is unsustainable in a dangerous world.

Thankfully, President Trump has made a commitment to request $1.5 trillion for defense spending next year. But the truth is, unless we begin to deal with our runaway debt, that money is just going to be borrowed, and we need to do better. We need to do significantly better.

But the good news is we made a down payment in the Working Families Tax Cut Act, saving $400 billion over 10 years.

You may think: Well, $38 trillion, $400 billion--that is just a drop in the ocean. But it is a start. We need to do more, and I trust that we will. We have to.

As many people know, our national debt is actually not a revenue problem. It is not how much--it is not that we don't collect enough taxes, as our friends on the Democratic side seem to think. They don't think there is any tax that shouldn't be raised. It is a spending problem.

I just came from a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee, where a new anti-fraud prosecutor has been nominated by President Trump. He testified that what we saw happen in the Somali daycare scandal is just the tip of the iceberg--make believe, nongovernmental organizations providing nonexistent daycare services and bilking the American taxpayer of billions of dollars.

The Government Accountability Office has documented that there is between $2 billion and $500 billion of improper payments. That is money that should not be paid to the recipients of those funds.

And part of it is structural, it seems to me, because when the Federal Government appropriates money, much of that money is then contracted out to service providers or grantees or the like.

But one of the things we have to do is to make sure that there is accountability for those funds and that they are being spent for their intended purpose, not that they are being syphoned off by fraudsters and people that are taking advantage of the generosity of the American people.

But it is not just about the fraudsters and the generosity of the American people. It is about that this is money that could be used to address our debt and to make sure we can allocate the money that we do spend for proper purposes, like maintaining our national security.

Well, unfortunately, when it comes to spending, you know, the saying goes: Somebody is spending like a drunken sailor--which shows a lot of disrespect to sailors. And, unfortunately, it is much, much worse than that. It is like the mindset of an alcoholic giving into the addiction, accepting the notion that our current situation is hopeless. So we might as well enjoy ourselves in the meantime. Well, that is a recipe for disaster.

Time and time again, we hear such tropes as this: Well, the real problem is mandatory spending. So why should we even try to cut discretionary spending?

Well, we need to look at all of it. We shouldn't shy away from any and all conversations when it comes to addressing our spending problem.

But the truth is, just like someone with an addiction to alcohol or gambling who wants to reform, you have got to start somewhere. And, last year, we made important reforms in our mandatory spending programs to make sure that, for example, illegal aliens don't receive free healthcare, and we strengthened work requirements for able-bodied adults who are receiving government benefits. It is not too much to ask that an able-bodied adult get off the couch, quit watching soap operas or playing video games, and contribute to their own support and the support of their family and their community and Nation. It is not too much to ask.

But I would argue that we need more than just trimming around the edges. We need a full change of mindset when it comes to our spending problem. That is where Russ Vought comes in.

Russ Vought is President Trump's Director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, and he has helped create a paradigm shift that Washington has long needed in order to get our spending under control. Instead of throwing up his hands, as many in Washington have done before him, Mr. Vought and his team have put their noses to the grindstone to cut spending anywhere and everywhere possible.

Under his leadership, the Office of Management and Budget are on track to reduce the deficit by more than $15 trillion over the next 10 years. That is real money. That is real money.

Let's take a look at some of the places where these savings are coming from. For starters, mandatory spending reforms in Medicaid, student loan forgiveness, and food stamps will add up to $2 trillion in savings over the next 10 years. Revenue from President Trump's tariffs add up to another $200 billion, which the Office of Management and Budget projects will raise $4 trillion in debt over time.

In addition, deregulation--taking the handcuffs off of huge American jobs' engines--and tax reforms are expected to spur economic growth, which the Office of Management and Budget projects would account for an additional $5.6 trillion in savings. OMB's projections include nearly $2 trillion in savings from lower debt servicing payment. So not only is the debt the problem, but the interest you have to pay on that debt just racks up more debt. But when you begin to cut, that debt service or those interest payments go down, which help address the issue.

This is where it gets pretty interesting. With such a high national debt, our debt servicing costs or the interest payments on the debt have eclipsed spending on national defense, as I said a moment ago. This is a very troubling sign when we spend more money on interest on the national debt than we do on defense. The good news is that in the same way that paying off a credit card can reduce your monthly interest payments through these spending reforms championed by Mr. Vought and the administration, they will decrease our interest expenses on our debt. And over 10 years, that can really add up.

I was recently with Secretary Bessent, the Secretary of the Treasury, and he shared that the government is projected to save between $26 and $30 billion due to a reduction in the Federal workforce.

Mr. Vought's determination has encouraged those of us here in Congress who are inclined toward fiscal responsibility to return to the regular-order appropriations process and pump the brakes on continuing resolutions and omnibus spending packages, which have been the norm for a long time. Fortunately, we refrained from passing an omnibus spending package this Congress. But we have also made progress through regular- order appropriations on lowering year-over-year spending. Fiscal year 2026 nondefense discretionary spending totalled $18 billion less than 2025, and overall spending levels were about a billion dollars less. Of course, while a billion dollars may sound like pocket change compared to our national debt, again, it is heading in the right direction.

Considering the totality of what President Trump and his Office of Management and Budget have done, it is incredible to see that he has put the United States on track to erase, not just billions, but trillions in projected spending over the next 10 years. For too long, Washington has limited our imagination to think that our fiscal situation is hopeless. We have no choice.

President Trump and the excellent team he has put in place has changed all of that. All of us should be thankful for the excellent work that the President and OMB Director Vought and his team have done to meaningfully shift our fiscal situation in the right direction, save taxpayer money, and protect our Nation.

Of course, this work on taxes and spending represents just one small piece of the President's impressive record, as we were reminded last night. President Trump is helping to make America great again and his State of the Union was a powerful reflection on how far we have come this last year and what the future might look like--the bright future might look like--ahead of it.

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