mesut/congress_speeches huggingface dataset:
AMERICAN HEALTH CARE ACT OF 2017--Continued
Joe Manchin, III (Democrat, WV) \u2014 2017-7-27

I rise in support of the motion to commit by my friend from the State of Washington. Let me tell you why. prgtoken We have a problem that most all of you have in your States, which is opioids. This opioid addiction that goes on is affecting everybody--not just , not just s. I don't care whether you are poor or rich or whether you are conservative or liberal--it has no base at all; it is a silent killer. prgtoken For the first time, under the Affordable Care Act, we are able to get some treatment. We have not been able to do that before. The only treatment people have gotten before--when a parent comes to you and says: I just have to hope my child--if my child gets arrested, they can go into drug court, and maybe they can get some care, some treatment. prgtoken For the first time, through Medicaid, we can give treatment for opioid addiction. We never had this chance before, never had this opportunity. It is really lifesaving for these people. It gets them back into the workforce, too, and they can clean up their lives. They really want this done. prgtoken We are talking about 33,000 Americans who lost their lives in 2015. In any other scenario, that would be an epidemic or a pandemic. Here we go. We still don't have any adequate treatment centers. We have no way that we can go forward and fight this illness. We sit here and talk about it. prgtoken Now we are talking about, well, we know 16 million people are going to be thrown off. We know that. We know the premiums will go up 20 percent. prgtoken Some one said: You know, you can still have preexisting conditions. We are going to take care of them. They can find it. It is available. prgtoken I have said this before: A Rolls Royce is available to me; I just can't afford to buy it. That is what we are going to be faced with. prgtoken But this is fixable. What we have said about fixable, we as --there are those of us in this body who will sit down--as Senator Murray has said--will sit down tonight. We will start tonight if you want to and look at ways we can make this more effective, more beneficial for everybody. prgtoken When you think about the reinsurance, we know it has worked in Alaska. The Affordable Care Act--the so-called Care--has been out long enough now that we know where the problems are, we know where the fixes need to be, and we know how do it. We have seen Alaska do something that looks very promising. prgtoken Also, when Vice President was Governor in Indiana, they did a Medicaid expansion in Indiana. They are putting in accountability and responsibility. It has great effects. My good friend Mitch Daniels was the Governor at the time they put this plan into place, and it has worked and worked well. prgtoken We are willing to sit and talk. These are good things. We think we can make this happen. We have been shut down at every turn. I have said: This is not how we were taught in West Virginia. It is not
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2018
Jerrold Nadler (Democrat, NY) \u2014 2017-7-27

an additional 1 minute. prgtoken Not only should all willing and able Americans be allowed and encouraged to serve--they already do. A report prepared for the Department of Defense estimates thousands of transgender individuals serve today, without issue. prgtoken The President must not impose blanket bans that prejudge servicemembers based on their identity, rather than their own merits. President is attacking people who have shown a willingness-- indeed, an eagerness--to risk their lives in the service of our country. It is apparent that the decision to ban transgender people from military service was taken without consulting Secretary of Defense Mattis, who seemed surprised by the tweets, or the military, which seems at a loss as to how to implement the order. prgtoken Even if this bigoted order is motivated by political opportunism, it disgraces our country and must be rescinded. prgtoken , .
COUNTERING AMERICA'S ADVERSARIES THROUGH SANCTIONS ACT
Robert Menendez (Democrat, NJ) \u2014 2017-7-27

let me thank the ranking member for his kind comments. I thank the chairman for his continuous engagement in this regard and his leadership. prgtoken I remind my colleagues that what gave us the vehicle to consider Russia and North Korea was the countering Iran act that I was pleased to author with the chairman and with the ranking member and other colleagues in a bipartisan approach. prgtoken When we started on Iran, there were those who wanted to look only at its intercontinental ballistic missile violations. I and others persisted and said: Wait a minute. Iran is far more nefarious in its activities--beyond intercontinental ballistic missiles. prgtoken It is collective leadership that brought us to a much broader bill that we are about to vote on today, where Iran is being pursued for the violation of its international order. prgtoken We just had the Prime Minister of Lebanon here, and he was saying to us: If you are concerned about Hezbollah, then find where the source of the prgtoken money is. The source of money for Hezbollah is Iran. If you are concerned about intercontinental ballistic missiles, I would add, it is Iran. If you are concerned about the greatest exporter of terrorism, it is Iran. If you are concerned about human rights violations within Iran, it is the leadership of Iran. prgtoken This is about sending a message to Iran that, in fact, when you violate the international order, there are consequences to it. It is about sending a message to Russia that when you violate the international order, annex Crimea, invade Ukraine, indiscriminately bomb civilians in Syria--and then when you try to affect the elections of the United States of America, you have a cyber attack, from my view, on the election process. prgtoken We can debate whether it affected the election. That is not the issue. The mere fact that Russia tried to affect our elections should be upsetting from the average citizen to the President of the United States. We have an opportunity to make very clear to Russia and to any other nation that this will not be tolerated. prgtoken Finally, to North Korea: North Korea's dangerous provocations in its path to nuclear weapons and a delivery system to be able to deliver those nuclear weapons are some of the greatest challenges we have. prgtoken We have an opportunity to come here today and say: You have to observe the international order. We have to go back to the basis of the rules that ultimately came about after our leadership in World War II to preserve the international order that has brought us peace and prosperity. prgtoken There are only a handful of peaceful diplomacy tools you can pursue. One of them is the use of sanctions in order to try to prod countries to move in a certain direction and to observe the international order. That is our opportunity today with Iran, with Russia, with North Korea. I hope we will seize it unanimously because when we do that, we send the mo
AMERICAN HEALTH CARE ACT OF 2017--Continued
Patrick J. Leahy (Democrat, VT) \u2014 2017-7-27

on Tuesday, the Vice President cast a tie- breaking vote to move to debate on a healthcare reconciliation bill, the contents of which even now remain a mystery to most of us. prgtoken This vote to proceed without a transparent path forward underscores a process that has, from the beginning, been politics and policymaking at their worst. You would think that, after 7 years of campaigning to repeal the Affordable Care Act, the majority would have a plan in place to do just that. Instead, a dozen or so male, lawmakers met behind closed doors, shielded from public view, to negotiate a grand plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act and make devastating cuts to the Medicaid Program--no hearings, no debate, no process. This is not the path taken when we considered, debated, and approved the Affordable Care Act. This is not the way the Senate, the greatest deliberative body in the world, should conduct such far-reaching and impactful business. This is not the Senate that I know and respect. prgtoken In spite of multiple drafts and a go-it-alone, hyperpartisan philosophy, the majority leader was still unable to garner enough support within his own Caucus to pass a sweeping healthcare bill. I joined with many to offer motions to get the Senate back to regular order and have the appropriate committees study the effects of these policies on Medicaid beneficiaries and those with disabilities, on women and children, on seniors and the most vulnerable, but s voted down those efforts and plowed ahead. During this debate, the Senate has also considered multiple amendments to rewrite the Affordable Care Act. Each of these amendments would have caused tens of millions of Americans to lose insurance and would have made it harder for those with preexisting conditions to obtain coverage. When those amendments failed, the leadership attempted to fully repeal the Affordable Care Act. That did not work either. prgtoken The collapse of these ideas should have resulted in a renewed spirit of bipartisanship, where we could work together to stabilize and improve the health insurance markets. Instead, the majority is so intent on voting on anything, that we are considering voting to repeal two or three policies from the Affordable Care Act solely in order to get something through the Senate and into conference with the House. This is nothing more than legislative malpractice. We are presumably considering a bill that will devastate our health insurance markets, and the best reason the s can come up with for supporting final passage is ``because we said we would.'' prgtoken The notion that this majority would reduce themselves--and the Senate--to finding the lowest common denominator in order to move ahead with a policy of this magnitude is not only absurd, it is dangerous. While all the versions of the plans we have seen differ slightly, they all hav
WASTEFUL SPENDING ON BORDER WALL
Vicente Gonzalez (Democrat, TX) \u2014 2017-7-27

I rise today to speak out against the wasteful spending of $1.6 billion of taxpayers' money. prgtoken These funds will be used to construct unnecessary barriers along our Southern border, destroying wildlife habitats, and violating property rights of Americans. If we want to be more secure, we should appropriately fund to address CBP staffing issues, to maintain and upgrade aerostats and other technology, and to provide CBP with the resources it actually needs to continue maintaining a safe and secure border. prgtoken Building a wall along our Southern border will put us on the wrong side of history. It will also be a shameful act in front of the international community that is watching us. prgtoken , I support the Department of Homeland Security's mission to safeguard the American people, our homeland, and our values. These are not our values. But the congressional misallocation of over $1.5 billion does not help to accomplish this goal. prgtoken I urge my colleagues to oppose the funding of this expensive, unnecessary wall. I call on them to find more productive and effective uses of this fund in a way that better helps the American people and is on the right side of American history.
HONORING RAMON ANIBAL RAMOS, A TRUE LEADER
Adriano Espaillat (Democrat, NY) \u2014 2017-7-27

I rise today to recognize Ramon Anibal Ramos, a leading communicator and television producer born in Ingenio Angelina, San Pedro de Macoris, in the Dominican Republic. prgtoken Ramon has had a long and successful career. Ramon obtained his passport through the `` `Fiesta' de Tele Antillas'' program. His show, the ``Ramon Anibal Show,'' is focused on the dissemination of positive news, positive stories about people, particularly immigrants that have excelled in America, and particularly in New York. prgtoken Throughout all of this time, particularly during the negative anti- immigrant rhetoric that is going on right now, including this week's push to build a divisive border wall, Ramon Anibal is the embodiment of being an immigrant, a pioneer, and successful contributor to our community. prgtoken Thank you, Ramon, for being such a role model and leader in our community. prgtoken Ramon Anibal Ramos, ``the best of cable,'' ``lo mejor del cable.''
AMERICAN HEALTH CARE ACT OF 2017--Continued
Patty Murray (Democrat, WA) \u2014 2017-7-27

I want all my colleagues and everyone listening right now to be very clear about what leadership is planning for today. Faced with defeat after defeat on their plans to rip apart our healthcare system--``no'' on a bill that would spike families' premiums, gut Medicaid, and deny 22 million people healthcare; ``no'' on a bill that would cause chaos and healthcare costs to skyrocket and deny 32 million people healthcare--it appears the leader has a last-ditch plan waiting in the wings. prgtoken As soon as they have an official score from the CBO--which could be hours from now--in the dead of night, Senator McConnell will bring forward legislation that , patients, families, and even many Senate s have not seen, and try to pass it before anyone can so much as blink. prgtoken Now, we have heard rumors about what could be in this bill, and based on what we know, took it upon ourselves to do the best we could to figure out what its impact will be. The CBO scored our best guess at what s are talking about doing, and here is what they found: Sixteen million people will lose their healthcare coverage in the next 10 years under this bill; premiums will increase by 20 percent every single year for the next 10 years; your premiums will increase 20 percent every single year in the next 10 years, all while special interests in the healthcare industry are going to get a massive tax break. prgtoken s could still play games with the language as they negotiate in secret somewhere to try to get a bit ``better'' than this, but no matter what they do here, if they jam it through, they will be held accountable for the millions of people who lose care and the millions and millions more who will see their premiums go up. prgtoken I hope, when my Senate colleagues began their process, they were not planning to pass a bill in the dark of night to deny millions of people healthcare and hand special interests billions in tax breaks, but, right now, that is the path they are careening down-- even as more and more people are speaking up about what the impact of this legislation would have. prgtoken In fact, just yesterday, a bipartisan group of 10 Governors wrote a letter urging Senate s to reject this secret bill, saying it would--I am quoting 10 bipartisan Governors--``accelerate health plans leaving the individual market, increase premiums, and result in fewer Americans having access to coverage.'' prgtoken I hope every single Senate read that letter. prgtoken I also hope they understand that if they pass this bill tonight, it will only get worse from here. If this secret bill--the lowest common denominator--goes through and a conference starts with the House, then every Senate who voted for it has just bought Care a trip to the White House. The Senate s who so loudly made clear they hated the Tru
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2018
Peter Welch (Democrat, VT) \u2014 2017-7-27

. Mr. Chair, in communities across the country, our infrastructure is falling apart. This fact was highlighted once again when the American Society of Civil Engineers released its 2017 Infrastructure Report Card which gave our nation's infrastructure a D+ rating. That is not acceptable and we must do better. prgtoken One area of particular concern is the state of our nation's dams. In far too many communities, darns are in danger of breaching. As we recently saw at the Oroville Dam in California, dam breaches can cause catastrophic consequences to the surrounding communities. prgtoken Last year, Congress took a positive step to address this issue with the passage of the Water Infrastructure Improvement for the Nation (WIIN) Act. In particular, Section 1177 of the WIIN Act authorized funding for the Army Corps of Engineers to begin working to rehab some of our nation's oldest, Corps-constructed dams that are classified as ``high hazard potential''. As many of you know, the failure of a dam that is classified as high-hazard potential is anticipated to cause loss of life. prgtoken While Section 1177 is a positive start, it needs to be funded so the Corps can get to work. My amendment would simply direct the Army Corps to use existing funds within its Construction Account to implement this provision up to its authorized level of $10 million. prgtoken Both parties agree we need to improve our infrastructure. This is a modest proposal to address some of the most outdated, hazardous dams in the country. prgtoken I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.
AMERICAN HEALTH CARE ACT OF 2017--Continued
Mazie K. Hirono (Democrat, HI) \u2014 2017-7-27

so many of us have spoken so many times now against the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, which would hurt millions and millions of people in our country and especially the sickest, poorest, and oldest among us. prgtoken I would say that I am probably the only Senator here who was not born in a hospital. I was born at home in rural Japan. I lost a sister to pneumonia when she was only 2 years old in Japan. She died at home, not in a hospital, where maybe her life could have been saved. prgtoken It is hard for me to talk about this. I think you can tell. Give me a moment. prgtoken When I came to this country as an immigrant, my mother brought me and my brothers to this country so we could have a chance at a better life. We came here with nothing. She had low-paying jobs. There was no health coverage. Growing up as a young girl in Hawaii, my greatest fear was that my mother would get sick and, if she got sick, how were we going to pay for her care, and how would she go to work? If she didn't go to work, there would be no pay, there would be no money. I know what it is like to run out of money at the end of the month. That was my life as an immigrant here. prgtoken Now, here I am, a U.S. Senator. I am fighting kidney cancer, and I am just so grateful that I had health insurance so that I could concentrate on the care that I needed rather than how the heck I was going to afford the care that is going to probably save my life. prgtoken Guess what. When I was diagnosed with kidney cancer and facing my first surgery, I heard from so many of my colleagues, including so many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, who wrote to me wonderful notes sharing with me their own experience with major illness in their families or with their loved ones. prgtoken You showed me your care. You showed me your compassion. Where is that tonight? prgtoken I can't believe that a single Senator in this body has not faced an illness or whose family member or loved one has not faced illness who was not so grateful that they had healthcare. I cannot believe there is a single Senator who has not experienced that in their family or their lives. prgtoken I know how important healthcare is. What is in here? Why doesn't every single Senator know that? Why are we here tonight voting on a bill that has not had a single hearing? Why are we here tonight voting on a bill that would eliminate healthcare coverage that could save lives for 16 million people? Why are we here voting on a bill that would probably mean that people like me, millions in this country, who are now in the ranks of those receiving care with preexisting conditions will not get the healthcare we need? Why are we here tonight? Where is your compassion? Where is the care you showed me when I was diagnosed with my illness? prgtoken I find it hard to believe that we can sit here and vote on a bill that is going to hurt millions and millions of people in our country
AMERICAN HEALTH CARE ACT OF 2017--Continued
Charles E. Schumer (Democrat, NY) \u2014 2017-7-27

let me thank my colleagues on the other side of the aisle for yielding us time. prgtoken This august body has been around for over 220 years. It has rules. It has traditions we are very proud of. In recent years--both parties to blame--many of those traditions have been eroded. What happens when you erode the traditions--the bipartisanship, the ability to work through the regular order--is very simply that the product that emerges is not very good. There is a reason this body has been the greatest deliberative body in the world, and it is because it had those traditions. Now we don't have them. prgtoken We have a bill that we have seen for 2 hours. It affects the healthcare, perhaps the lives--almost certainly the lives--of millions. It affects the daily lives of men and women and children. We haven't even had a chance to explore all the ramifications. There is a lot of anger on the other side at the ACA. I understand that, but you are repeating what you claim are the same mistakes. prgtoken Just as maybe Care could have been made better if it were a bipartisan proposal, this one certainly would have been made better. This skinny repeal, CBO tells us, will kick 15 million people--16 million people--off care. This skinny bill, after all the cries of reducing premiums as the major reason that Care needed changes, will raise premiums 20 percent a year, ad infinitum. The average working family is going to struggle to get healthcare even more than they have now. prgtoken Why is this being rushed through this way? Why is this being done in the dark of night? I can't believe my colleagues are proud of it. If they were, there would be brass bands down the streets of smalltown America celebrating this bill. That is not what is happening. It is midnight. Debate is curtailed. We can't amend it in the open. We can't do what is needed. prgtoken So I would plead once more with my colleagues, let's start over. We are the first to admit that the present law needs some changes. We are the first to want--maybe having learned our own lessons--that it should be done in a bipartisan and sharing way. Let's start over. prgtoken We can do better. We can do better for all those people who are going to be hurt. We can do better for the traditions of this great institution. We can do better as Americans who love our country and love our democracy and love our process. It is not too late to turn back from this proposal ideologically driven and do better because we all are not proud of this product. I don't think there is hardly anyone in this body who is proud of this product. prgtoken Let's make this a turning point, not just on healthcare but in how we function together. We plead with you, let us commit this bill. Let us vote against skinny repeal, and let's work together to improve our healthcare system in the way our Founding Fathers intended us to improve it. prgtoken