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Congressional Daily Record
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April 30, 2026
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Download official Senate Record PDFReturn to issue contextMr. LANKFORD. Mr. President, I don't know if you remember 1977. But since 1977, this body has passed the 12 appropriation bills on time 4 times since 1977. By the way, this year is not one of them. Since 1977, four times the budget process has worked correctly.
period, but they are getting worse—not better, as this Congress continues to be able to find cliffs to be able to stand next to and figure out how long we can put our toes over the edge.
The latest one ended today. It was 76 days long, and it shut down the Department of Homeland Security. Now, I remind everyone in this body, the first priority of the U.S. Government is defense and security—the first priority.
This body decided not to fund Homeland Security for 76 days. This is an issue we have got to face.
Hampshire, she and I sat down and said: We have got to figure out how to get out of this. This is a cycle that is continuing.
our colleagues there is a way to prevent future government shutdowns that would hold Congress accountable but the American people and Federal workers would not feel the effect of it. And it is a very simple straightforward idea that we have worked on now since 2019. It is when this body has not finished their work on time, we stay until the work is finished.
connected to those Federal dollars, they continue. They are held harmless, while we have to stay until it is done.
idea, apparently. We have worked for years to be able to get to the point that we can pass it.
Last session, we brought it to this body and had 57 votes; we need 60, as this body knows full well. We had 57 supporters last time we brought it to this body.
Now, there has been an election since then. We have also had two very long shutdowns since then, and my understanding is there are even more of my colleagues that are stepping forward and saying it is time that we end the shutdown dramas and actually get things resolved.
We don't bring a political solution; we don't bring a messaging solution; we just bring a solution. This solution had been evaluated in previous Presidential time by President Biden's team
in his Office of Management and Budget. It has been reviewed by now President Trump's team, his Office of Management and Budget. Everyone has looked at it and said: Yep, that works.
is time to vote to be able to figure out if once and for all we can end government shutdowns.
Now, the idea, as I mentioned, is simple: We stay here until the work is done. But let me give you an example of what that would look like just in this shutdown. This particular shutdown with Homeland Security, we were shut down for 76 days because my Democratic colleagues did not want to fund ICE or Border Protection, so we had a 76-day shutdown.
days—less than half. For 76 days, the Department of Homeland Security was nonoperable, unfunded. We were here 35 of those days. If you think that is bad, let's talk about the House of Representatives. They were in session 29 of those 76 days. In other words, the problem was all over the country, and Congress was AWOL.
if weekend plans or time away from here is more important than Homeland Security of all things. We should have never left.
the problem, but everybody left. Let's fix that. Let's make the most simple commitment that we can possibly make to the American people, and that is, if we get to a moment like this again—and we will—we will not leave until the work is done.
Federal workers will not have to worry about not being paid. Contractors will not have to worry about not being paid. Programs will be able to continue to operate. We are the ones that will actually have to stay after class. They won't feel it there. That seems to be a much better option than mass chaos across the country while we suffer no consequences for it.
been good, to be able to talk about how do we actually not have this happen again. Part of the conversation has been: Let's just pay the employees and not pay the programming but we can still continue to be able to leave and come and go like normal but at least people will be paid.
principle for the last month. For the last month, President Trump has taken some of the emergency funding set aside in the bill we passed last year in reconciliation, has used that to be able to pay employees. So employees of Homeland Security have been paid, but the programming hasn't been done. So literally we have had a test run on that idea. What if we just paid the employees but didn't pay the programming, wouldn't that solve the problem? What has now been discovered is: Oh, no, that definitely doesn't solve the problem.
6,000 different residences for just the Coast Guard that their power is being shut off because the bills haven't been paid for the last 2 months. And, amazingly enough, utility folks like to be paid— remarkable.
statement that was pretty bold for the Commandant to be able to make, but he is dead-on correct. The Commandant of the Coast Guard made this statement about the ongoing shutdown right now of Homeland Security including the U.S. Coast Guard. He said:
It's more than a breach of trust . . . Our Coast Guard men
and women, whether they're active duty or reserve military
civilians, they've stepped forward and taken an oath to
support and defend the Constitution. What they expect in
return is just to be paid and [to] provide services.
They don't expect “to have to worry about whether their families are going to be taken care of.”
Commandant of the Coast Guard the power was shut off because the bills hadn't been paid. If you want to go to the Coast Guard station in Hawaii, they were literally working at the station by flashlight.
What does that mean? Simple things, like in FEMA, all the fire training centers, all the domestic preparedness conferences, all the things that we do to be able to prepare for a hurricane coming up this fall, those things couldn't happen. All the work to be able to prepare for wildfires, none of that could actually happen. For our Cybersecurity professionals, while we have an ongoing conflict with Iran, many were furloughed or couldn't do their work. While we were preparing for FIFA, for literally the whole world coming to the United States, we couldn't do preparation for security for them coming.
be able to protect the President, much of the executive branch and reporters this past weekend at the White House Correspondents' Dinner— thank you for the work that you were doing—but they had no additional money to be able to plan and operate because this body chose to go home rather than fund them.
us: We stay until the work gets done. And simply saying: We will pay people but then walk away doesn't solve the problem because contractors don't get paid, utility bills don't get paid, all the grants don't get done, the other tasks are still not there. So just paying the employees but they can't do anything doesn't solve the problem. It just pays people that are sitting at a desk, wishing they could do their job, but they have no money to do it, or in this case, for the Coast Guard, they are working at their station by flashlight.
That should not be so in the United States of America. This is not a partisan bill. It is not even a partisan issue. Republicans and Democrats alike have put a stake in the ground and said: We are going to shut the government down because we are mad. We have both done it on both sides. Let's just say we are done with it.
have my grandchildren crawl up in my lap and say: Tell me a story about the time when the government used to shut down—because it never happens in their generation. Let's find a way to be able to actually resolve this like grownups, work out our differences, and not have government shutdowns.
what she has done to be able to get the text right and to be able to get this resolved.
government shutdowns need to end. So I am looking forward to us getting this finally, finally resolved.
I yield the floor.
Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.