Republicans Push Voter ID, DHS Funding and ENDING the Gas Tax in Major Presser!

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]Um, most of us, at least all of us here, and I think a lot of people this week are celebrating National Police Week.

[00:00:07]It's the week when we honor those uh who um serve us in law enforcement. And I think it's safe to say that we need law enforcement officers in this country. We need them to apprehend violent criminals. We need them to uh keep our border safe, to ensure that our immigration laws are being enforced to protect these buildings. We need law enforcement officers. And tragically, this calendar year already, there have been 38 law enforcement officers who have been killed in the line of duty.

[00:00:39]And so, this is a week when we honor them and we express our gratitude and appreciation to them and to their families for u all that law enforcement does in this country to keep our our country and our communities safe. Uh the Democrats on the other hand, as has been very clear for some time, seem to be very comfortable with allowing um this defund law enforcement, defund police movement with which they have been associated for some time now to continue and have blocked funding for the Department of Homeland Security, uh for ICE, for uh Customs and Border Patrol, the folks who keep our border safe and secure, and uh have been blocking it now for several months. And as a consequence, we will have to move forward, and we will next week with the Secure America Act, which is a bill that will fund those critical law enforcement agencies and ensure that they're funded not only today, but into the future through the duration of President Trump's term. So, um, I like I said, I I think it's shameful that we are even having to have a conversation like this, but we have a Democrat party that has embraced the ideas of open borders and defunding the police. And as a consequence of that, uh, we're having to deal, um, in a in a way that allows us to do this with Republican votes because Republicans have law enforcement's back, and we will do everything that we can to ensure that they have all they need to keep our country, uh, our border, and our communities safe.

[00:02:12]>> Yeah.

[00:02:12]>> Yeah. Thank you. Um, so you just had a lunch meeting heard that Secret Service director had joined. Can you shed some light on what the conversation was and also where you think your conference is with regard to given the billion dollars for water, >> right? So the the the question I think that he was addressing was how is the money going to be used the billion dollars? And so he walked through the various categories and uh about 20% of that is going to be used to secure uh the modernization of the east wing. Most of it's going to be used for other purposes. Uh training facilities for technology. Um lots of other things that law enforcement particularly in this case uh secret service needs to ensure that they keep their our president and other uh top officials safe. So it was a good back and forth, a good discussion and obviously we had a lot of questions that were asked by our colleagues um just to get the details and you know precision as much as possible about how dollars are going to be used and um and I think that the the uh director did a very good job of laying it out and and developing the case for why uh these resources need to be u used to update, modernize and um and make sure the security service is capable of doing job secret service I should say.

[00:03:31]>> Are you confident that the $1 billion for ballroom security, White House security will survive a third group challenge in front of the parliamentarian?

[00:03:39]>> Well, we're having those discussions. As you all know, the um the parliamentarian who evaluates any uh proposal under reconciliation, we have a back and forth and that's that's underway right now.

[00:03:51]So, we are having the quote bird scrub and um making the arguments in front of the parliamentarian. The Democrats obviously uh doing their best to try and undermine anything that we're trying to accomplish here. But, um I'm pretty confident based on past experience because we did dealt with this significantly in a significant way, I should say, last summer uh during the working families tax cuts legislation.

[00:04:14]uh some of these funding issues came up then and uh there was a formula frankly that was put in place by the Democrats with the two reconciliation bills that they did when they had unified control of the government that has given us the the um the road map if you will to get this done. So I'm confident that we will be in good shape but that process right now is underway.

[00:04:35]>> Where are Senate Republicans at currently on getting the Save America Act passed? There was quite a bit of momentum on that few weeks back. seems like it sort of dwindled despite overwhelming support from the American people. Where do you stand on that currently? Would you reconsider getting rid of the filibust and get it across the finish line?

[00:04:50]>> We don't have the votes to get rid of the filibuster. Um we did we called it up on the floor March I think 17th. We were on it for several weeks and um had a very spirited debate. In fact, u I actually I think with the exception of maybe a couple of Republican senators made more speeches on the floor in support of the Save Act than almost any other senator. and we had some votes on it and we voted on the narrow issue which is the most popular one of voter ID and we put the Democrats on the record. Every single Democrat voted against it. Uh we added and one of the other elements also popular was whether or not biological boys ought to playing girls sports. We had that vote and every Democrat voted against that as well. So we've taken what I think are probably the two issues in my view that have the broadest public support and put the Democrats on record and every single one of them voted against it. So, we'll look for opportunities to get other votes.

[00:05:42]There was a vote on the budget resolution, an amendment that Senator Kennedy offered um that didn't even get 50 votes on the floor. And um so, we're we're continuing to look for opportunities to advance that uh legislation. Obviously, it's something that I support. I think we all support and uh we think it's something that the um the American people are broadly supportive as well.

[00:06:04]>> There's tagging between the courts about whether or not can be constructed. Um, and they've been asking for some kind of congressional authorization to to move forward with the courts. Do you consider this this $1 billion, this reconciliation bill to be the congressional authorization that the courts would need to be able to go forward with construction?

[00:06:28]>> If the if this gets litigated, you're talking about >> Yeah. So it's if this gets passed, do you see this as the congressional authorization is that the court that would be good enough to be able to be okay going forward with you know construct?

[00:06:42]>> Well, I mean I think that the the ballroom is uh being financed privately but the security associated with it is I think represents about 20% of what this request was. this Secret Service request which frankly does fit perfectly within the confines of the legislation on the floor because it's the judiciary committee's jurisdiction. U most of that's going to go to other things. It's going to do it's going to be used for training. It's going to be for updates and technology uh for um you know the number of the protectes that they have to deal with is ensuring that they have the resources to cover that cover those people. So it's it's a request uh much of wi which would be dealt with during the normal appropriations process but because the Democrats won't allow for a normal appropriations process is being done through reconciliation. But my assumption would be that if Congress authorizes something like this that yeah I assume the courts would uphold it.

[00:07:37]It's a It's essentially us doing Republicans doing the work that the appropriations committee would normally do and did, by the way, um and reported a bill out favorably, which the Democrats subsequently walked away from and then, you know, held up and shut down the government for 60 days or thereabouts, uh over funding for these two agencies. So, um again, I think this is a a perfectly um normal way. It's not normal, but it's certainly uh within the confines of what we are are are allowed to do to get funding for this important agency done given the obstruction that the Democrats have posed and their unwillingness to fund law enforcement.

[00:08:20]>> Are you supportive of the gas tax holiday?

[00:08:22]>> Am I?

[00:08:23]>> Are you supportive of it?

[00:08:24]>> Well, I'm listening. I mean, I think right now, um, you you probably know I've not in the past been a huge fan of previous attempts, although when this was tried during the Biden administration, uh, gas prices were going up largely in response to the Biden energy policies. Uh, this obviously is a very different set of circumstances, but um, if the president wants to make that case, I think we're all willing to hear it. We've had uh some of our colleagues who've come out in support of, you know, repealing or at least temporarily repealing the gas tax, but obviously that has implications for the highway trust fund. And um so those are things you have to take into consideration as well. And the question of course I always ask is if you did, it's 18.4 cents I think is the federal gas tax. Uh if you lifted that, does that ultimately get passed on to the consumer, to the customer, the to the buyer out there, or does it get sucked up in the supply chain somewhere? So, I think those are all fair questions to ask, but it's a conversation that um I think we're we're willing to have, and I'm certainly willing, I think most of our colleagues are, to hear uh the president's arguments if that's a case he wants to make to Congress. Thank you all. Thanks.