Laughter Erupts On The Senate Floor From Graham's Remarks After Running Out Of Time On BBB Debate

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) spoke about an amendment on the Big Beautiful Bill on the Senate floor Tuesday.

Transcript

00:00Senator from Oregon. Mr. President, it's been an extraordinary period here in the

00:04Senate. Not a good one because it's families lose and billionaires win. We

00:10kept advocating join us in a better vision for America in which families

00:14thrive and billionaires they pay their fair share for a change. Thank you so

00:22much to the floor staff for your steadfast support during the night. The

00:26parliamentarian team led by Elizabeth Dunna has been amazing, but I want to

00:31give particular thanks to the budget team, the revenue team, and the minority

00:35leaders team who worked so carefully together, competently, expertly. But the

00:42result, the result is bad for America. We need to come back and have a vision in

00:49which we lift up opportunity and hope for everyone in America, not this strategy of

00:56more wealth for the best off, while cutting the programs of health care, 16

01:02million people losing health care to fund tax breaks for billionaires, 4 million

01:06children going hungry to fund tax breaks for billionaires. This is morally wrong

01:11and we will keep fighting to the very end to say we can put America on a better

01:18course for this generation and the next.

01:25Mr. President. The other side of the story. But we agree on this. A lot of people work

01:33very hard on both sides of the aisle. Tensions have been high at times, but we're at the end

01:39now. And to all those who made this possible, thank you for your hard work. I'd like to make

01:44five very brief points about what I think is good about this bill. It's the most

01:50consequential border security package in the history of our country. So $175

01:56billion. It does several things. It hires more ICE agents. It finishes the wall and

02:05increases detention beds by 100,000. Let me tell you why that's important. In September

02:112022, Mr. Barra, who was convicted of killing Lakin Riley, the young lady in Georgia, not

02:18far from where I lived, was apprehended, but he was paroled. And why was he paroled? Subject

02:27was paroled due to detention capacity at the Central Processing Center in El Paso, Texas.

02:33They didn't have a bed for him, so they let him go. 18 months later, approximately, he kills

02:40Lake and Raleigh. Senators, time's expired. This bill fixes that and a bunch of other

02:45stuff. Thanks.