{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=E2AF432A-7D8E-4C60-BAE7-4302DD0B02A1", "The Worst Inflation in Four Decades", "2021-12-14", "2021", "2021-12", "Republican", "Senate", "KY", "Mitch McConnell", "M000355", "www.mcconnell.senate.gov", "mcconnell", "https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding Democrats\u2019 reckless tax and spending spree:\n\n\u201cWashington Democrats\u2019 printing, borrowing, and spending addiction is directly hurting American families.\n\n\u201cTwo thirds of the American people \u2014 a supermajority \u2014 are worried about inflation.\n\n\u201cAbout half the middle class and 70 percent of low-income families say soaring prices have personally hurt their household.\n\n\u201cAnd it isn\u2019t getting better, like the Biden Administration promised it would. It\u2019s getting worse.\n\n\u201cLast Friday, the Labor Department released a jaw-dropping report: The Consumer Price Index has shot up 6.8% over the past year. Six point eight percent inflation. The worst inflation in almost 40 years.\n\n\u201cNow, it\u2019s true that the average American worker has gotten pay increase since 2020. But rising prices have more than wiped that out.\n\n\u201cWe have a remarkable situation where American workers are earning raises, but their bigger paychecks buy their families even less than what their smaller paychecks bought before the Democrats took power.\n\n\u201cThe net effect is a nearly 2% pay cut for the average American.\n\n\u201cOur citizens know what\u2019s happening. 67% of the country says Washington needs to \u2018cut back on spending and printing money.\u2019\n\n\u201cBut here in Washington, leading Democrats want to plow ahead and double down on the reckless taxing and spending that got us here.\n\n\u201cThey want to respond to this stunning inflation report by printing, borrowing, and spending trillions upon trillions more on new entitlements and far-left programs.\n\n\u201cAnd if that weren\u2019t bad enough, on Friday, a new report showed their socialist shopping spree could cost the country trillions more than Democrats admit.\n\n\u201cYou see, as one of our Democratic colleagues explained last month, his party\u2019s bill is packed full of \u2018shell games\u2019 and \u2018budget gimmicks.\u2019\n\n\u201cFor example, their bill pretends that major new entitlements would simply expire after a few years.\n\n\u201cOf course, that never happens. As a wise man once said, \u2018nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program.\u2019 And Democrats aren\u2019t even pretending they think the spending would stop. They\u2019re boasting about a permanent transformation.\n\n\u201cThe fake expiration dates are just an accounting trick so the price tag looks artificially low.\n\n\u201cAnd last Friday, the Congressional Budget Office announced that if we acknowledge the permanent entitlements would be permanent, their bill would actually cost $4.9 trillion in the first decade alone.\n\n\u201cIt would explode the deficit by $3 trillion in that time.\n\n\u201cDemocrats are trying to reassure their alarmed members that they\u2019d find new ways to offset future extensions.\n\n\u201cBut think about it.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019ve just spent months shoving every possible pay-for into this existing bill. They already burned through huge, permanent tax hikes just to partially offset the bill with the gimmicks!\n\n\u201cExtending these programs further would either explode our national debt\u2026 or it would take even further trillions in even further gigantic tax hikes that Democrats will not specify.\n\n\u201cSo which is it? Historic deficits or trillions more in secret tax hikes? The right answer for the country is neither.\n\n\u201cLater today, every Senate Democrat is going to vote on party lines to raise our nation\u2019s debt limit by trillions of dollars.\n\n\u201cIf they jam through another reckless taxing and spending spree, this massive debt increase will just be the beginning.\n\n\u201cMore printing and borrowing. To set up more reckless spending. To cause more inflation. To hurt working families even more. The American people need a break.\u201d", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T20:37:48Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=E2AF432A-7D8E-4C60-BAE7-4302DD0B02A1"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 2.4692260194569826, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}