Senate

In his maiden speech Tuesday afternoon, Tea Party favorite Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) delivered his vision of a restored American economy, unhampered by debt and government over-regulation.

"The American people haven’t forgotten how to start a business," Rubio said. "The American people haven’t run out of good ideas.

"We Americans are as great as we have ever been but our government is broken," he said. "It is keeping us from doing what we have done better than any people in the history of the world: create jobs and prosperity." Read more...

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) suggested he had grown weary of politics in Washington during a speech delivered right before the Senate knocked down one of his amendments.

The Senate on Tuesday delivered a resounding bipartisan defeat to an amendment Coburn sponsored that would have saved $6 billion in tax credits and subsidies by the end of the fiscal year. 

“There's nothing about this that makes sense other than if you are a wonk and study the politics and the procedures and the parochialism that goes on inside the political body,” said Coburn, describing the complicated alliances that combined later in the afternoon to bring down his amendment.

Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) warned Tuesday that the U.S. was “without direction” and headed to a dangerous escalation in NATO’s war against Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.

“It’s been over 60 days since the president notified the Congress that he intended to use military force in Libya,” Udall said in comments on the Senate floor. “We are adrift. Without direction.”

Udall warned the U.S. “is heading down a slippery path towards an escalation of military force in Libya.”

A bipartisan group of 15 farm state senators introduced legislation on Monday that they hope can be seen as an alternative to Sen. Tom Coburn's (R-Okla.) proposal to immediately end the current tax credit for ethanol-gasoline blenders.

The bill, S. 1185, was introduced just hours before a scheduled Tuesday cloture vote on Coburn's amendment to the Economic Development Revitalization Act.

Almost three weeks after the Senate voted to defeat the Republicans' budget plan for fiscal year 2012, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is continuing to attack the proposal.

“We know Republicans have put together a budget that destroys Medicare,” said Reid from the floor on Tuesday. “That’s what we have received, we voted on it over here, it was turned down.”

A bipartisan proposal would let the White House liquidate up to $10 billion in Libyan assets to spend on aid.

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) on Monday blamed Republicans and President Bush for the nation's economic woes calling the Bush tax cuts one of the "greatest failed jobs programs in history." 

"It’s like my Republican colleagues have thrown a lavish diner party for the last decade and now they are telling us to pick up the tab," Menendez said. "These cuts for the rich have been one of the greatest failed jobs programs in our history and one of the most ineffective stimulus efforts in our history." Read more...

Sen. John Boozman (R-Ark.) slammed President Obama and Senate Democrats on Monday for pursuing policies he believes are crippling the economy and causing unemployment.

"Out of work Arkansans continue to struggle to find gainful employment," said Boozman. "What's more alarming is that the President and majority here in the Senate are resisting real change and instead are pursuing the same policies that gave us this sluggish economy.”

Two Republican senators from agricultural states attacked an amendment on Monday offered by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) that would eliminate about $6 billion in tax credits provided annually to blenders of ethanol.

The senators said the tax credits, which Coburn describes as a corporate subsidy, help reduce energy costs.

"This proposal would increase the cost of energy in this country and obviously impact people across the country whose livelihood depends on this," said Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) in comments Monday on the Senate floor. 

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) has introduced an amendment that would require the president to give Congress regular evaluations of the national security hazards posed by the nation's debt.

“The federal government’s reckless deficit spending has created a fiscal crisis and a growing national security vulnerability," said Cornyn in a statement. "A massive chunk of our debt is held by foreign governments such as Communist-led China, whose true motivations for doing so remain unclear."