Making Life More Affordable

Floor Speech

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Mr. HERNANDEZ. There is a common thread that connects families across Puerto Rico and the United States. It is the feeling of looking at a grocery receipt and wondering if the math is wrong. It is the worry that comes when the baby formula runs low or the doctor's bill comes due.

It is the simple, honest truth that for too many of our neighbors: It has simply become too expensive to live, and they are right to be frustrated. That is because while they are doing the hard work, waking up before dawn to get to the job and stretching every dollar to keep the lights on, Washington has made a different choice.

Donald Trump has chosen a war of his own making in Iran. As a result, every one of us is being asked to pay a war tax that we never voted for and that we cannot afford.

In Puerto Rico, we feel this more deeply than most. We see the ships on the horizon, and we know that almost everything we need to survive-- the food for our tables, the clothes for our children, and the fuel for our cars--comes from abroad.

When a war starts halfway around the world, it doesn't stay there. It makes the cost of running these ships higher, and so the cost of war shows up at our local gas station. It shows up at the supermarket in the price of a pound of chicken. It shows up in our paycheck where $10 here and $20 there are being snatched away to pay for a conflict we don't need.

Washington should focus more on us, not on another endless foreign war. Democrats are here fighting for Puerto Ricans. We are fighting for the mother in Puerto Rico who deserves the same help from SNAP to buy groceries as a mother in Florida or California. We are fighting for the grandfather who shouldn't be turned away at a medical appointment by his doctor because Medicaid ran out of money.

We are fighting for every family who deserves to know that when they flip the switch, they won't go bankrupt because of higher electricity and utility rates.

The Republican Party is thinking about war rooms and drones. We are thinking about living rooms and kitchen tables. Americans and Puerto Ricans should not have to bear the brunt of reckless decisions made thousands of miles away. We have done our part. Americans have worked the hours, they have kept the faith, and they deserve a government that finally puts them and their families first.

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