Research Center and or, you know, rehabilitation center, and it would just be a front for the collection of fraudulent Medicare payments, and there would be hundreds of fronts in one building, right that's.
You don't find that in Minneapolis, you find that in Miami.
We're good to go.
We're good to go.
So I'm happy to be joined by our new leadership team, Senator Durbin, Senator Klobuchar, and Senator Booker.
And I hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving.
My mom is 96 and we all went to my brother's little house in Connecticut.
She saw all of her children, her grandchildren, and her great -grandchildren.
So that was a true blessing.
And I hope everyone else had the same good, happy Thanksgiving.
Now, as you may know, today the Senate Democratic Caucus Voted unanimously on our new leadership team for the 119th Congress.
I know that this leadership team will help lead our caucus through this time of rebuilding, reflection and help serve the American people.
Serving as leader has been one of the greatest honors of my life.
And a large part of that honor is because my caucus is just an inspiring group of people.
I love them.
They work hard.
They have different views.
But everyone talks to each other.
We respect each other.
And you know, over the last four years, when I've been Majority Leader, we've had one of the most successful Senates in decades.
And that is in large part because our caucus is so good.
And I appreciate that very much.
We don't agree on everything.
We have different philosophies, different backgrounds.
Every single member loves his or her country.
And every one of them strives for unity, and that's one of the reasons, as I said, we've been successful.
After four years of the most productive and consequential years the Senate has had in decades, it's galvanized by faith in this Chamber's ability to get big things done for the country, even when there's such division, which of course there is now.
Most of the major bills we've passed, big bills like CHIPS, big bills like IRA, Well, except IRA.
Big bills like infrastructure and gun safety and gay marriage were done in a bipartisan way.
And that's a message to the new Senate.
You get things done, you get the most things done in a bipartisan way.
Senate Democrats will continue to dedicate every ounce of our strength, focus, and determination to fight and deliver for the American people.
Now, as you may know, yesterday I sent a letter.
To incoming Republican Leader Thune, urging him to uphold the Senate's constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on the Senate's nominations.
We're ready to work with the Republicans on the nomination process.
Each nominee is due the same fair and thorough consideration that previous nominees of both parties, no matter who was president, had received.
Let me repeat.
What we need to happen is for all the nominees to go through the same process that past nominees have gone through in the Senate, regardless of party,
including a full FBI background investigation and Senate reviewed.
It shouldn't just be the FBI doing it.
They've got to let the Senate know what they found.
Full hearings, where we get to ask the nominees questions.
And of course, the Senate vote.
And we're going to let that process unfold.
Senator Durbin.
Honored to be chosen by my colleagues to serve again as whip in the 119th Congress.
I want to thank and congratulate Senator Schumer.
It was a unified caucus meeting today that led to this decision.
And we have moved together effectively in the past and will continue to.
Happy to...
I have my colleagues, Senator Klobuchar, Senator Booker, as part of this team.
I'd like to repeat what Chuck Schumer said about the process.
Mark my words, you can't do a speed dating process for the cabinet of the President of the United States without ending up embarrassed and with things that are discovered only through a deep investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Do you know what the ordinary process had been in the past with previous presidents?
They would float the names to the FBI of possible people for the cabinet for a cursory investigation to see if there's anything they missed in the initial look.
And then if that came up thumbs up, they would announce it publicly and a deep, dark FBI investigation would ensue.
The suggestion by some is we're going to do away with that.
Some have suggested, well, maybe just the committee will take a look at it.
The Senate Judiciary Committee does not have the resources of the FBI.
We want to make certain the people serving this country at the highest and most sensitive positions have no background problems that jeopardize their service to this country.
That is not too much to ask.
I can tell you privately many Republican senators have spoken to me and said, for goodness sakes, we can't do away with the FBI check.
That is something that's just integral to the system.
They won't say it publicly for obvious reasons, obvious political reasons.
But we've got to stand for what Senator Schumer said yesterday.
The process that has served us so well under previous administrations, previous generations, and previous presidents has to be honored.
If they'll honor that, we've got to do our job and do it in a diligent fashion.
Thank you so much Chuck and thank you to this incredible team.
To Chuck and to Dick and to Corey.
Corey and I were both running for president at one point and it may or may not be true that we wrote notes to each other during a debate across the podiums and I will never do that to Chuck on your leadership team.
So I want to first of all talk about what I hope to bring to this, and that is that I am someone that believes you need to Stand your ground but also find common ground and look for solutions, and the American people are crying out for those solutions, and I have truly appreciated how Chuck has emphasized that that is part of our goals for the coming year, that we must chart a course to bring the American people what they need and what they want.
At the same time, we have to stand our ground.
My colleagues mentioned these nominees and the thought that we require FBI checks for lying prosecutors in the US Attorney's Office in Minnesota or for FBI agents in New Jersey, and that these people who are up And nominated to lead these agencies wouldn't have the same kind of background review given to us,
which it is our constitutional duty to advise and consent and our job to protect and uphold and support and defend the Constitution.
That's the oath that we take.
And to exercise that oath, we must have that information when we look at these nominees.
In addition, some of these other policies with the across -the -board tariffs or the... Additional tax cuts for the wealthy are things that are not in the best interest and we don't have the backs of the American people when we do that.
So I'm looking forward to a spirited debate with our colleagues but again always trying to use as a touch tone that we will find common ground.
I'm going to miss my buddies in the back row.
We all sit together for over a decade, and that's Bob Casey and John Tester and Sherrod Brown.
And think about that.
We're all together in one row.
At the same time, I know that in a number of our races in the U .S. Senate, thanks to Chuck's leadership and the people that worked on these races and our incredible senators, we were able to win those races in Michigan and Arizona and in Nevada and in Wisconsin.
And in many ways when you look at this election, we defied gravity.
What was that a reference to?
Wicked!
That's right.
We defied gravity.
And that is what we will continue to do in terms of reaching out to these people in our country, to the voters who maybe didn't hear us as well as they should have.
And so that's one of the reasons I'm so excited to be working with Corey on this.
Thank you.
Senator Booker, his first appearance as a membership of the Four Leaders.
I just want to thank Chuck Schumer.
The Four Leaders.
Was the Four something?
Not tops.
There was another one before something.
Go ahead, Corey.
Thank you.
I just want to thank Chuck Schumer, really.
It's been incredible the last four years to work with him and to be included in a lot of the important work of this caucus.
We've had an extraordinarily four years of accomplishment under with Joe Biden as the president and Chuck Schumer as the leader of the Senate.
He is a modern day LBJ just based upon what we've been able to deliver.
Thank you.
I got nothing for you on that.
As I said, I got nothing for you on that.
Nope.
Thank you.
I've got nothing for you on that.
I've got nothing for you on that.
Any other subjects?
Any other subjects?
Other subject?
Funding.
Go ahead.
We're trying to get the CR done, we're making good progress on it, and hopefully we'll get things done by the 20th deadline.
I'm pretty confident that will happen.
Yes, on funding.
Absolutely not, and the report never said it.
Well...
We're trying to get it done, but the problem is on the Republican side, where the Republican speaker and the Republican minority leader have different views on a top line.
Until they resolve that, we can't get it done.
Well, hopefully they will do it by next week.
Thank you, everybody.
The House will be in order.
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House Speaker Mike Johnson talked about the incoming Department of Government Efficiency before meeting with its nominated leaders, Elon Musk and former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.