Duckworth Holds Senate Floor to Protest Project 2025 Architect Russell Vought’s Cabinet Nomination and Trump’s Illegal Power Grabs That Are Harming the Middle Class and Our National Security

[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – Today, U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) joined Senate Democrats’ 30-hour protest opposing Project 2025 architect Russell Vought’s nomination to serve as the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) under President Donald Trump. Holding the floor, Duckworth delivered an impassioned speech slamming Trump and unelected billionaire Elon Musk’s ongoing illegal power grabs—including his unlawful federal grant freeze and his shuttering of USAID—that are inflicting pain on middle-class Americans and endangering our national security. Video of Duckworth’s opening remarks can be found on the Senator’s YouTube and her full speech can be found on the Senator’s Twitter/X and Facebook.

Key quotes:

• “Decades before I ever considered a career in politics, when I was just starting out in the Army, I raised my right hand and took an oath. I swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. I vowed to protect our nation against all enemies—foreign and domestic. And in this moment, at this precipice for our country, I need to make good on that promise. Because in the just 18 days since Donald Trump was inaugurated, we have witnessed an all-out assault on the system of checks and balances that our government was founded upon. We have seen the President both overreach and underdeliver: proving through executive orders and Twitter marching orders that he cares more about the billionaires who belong to Mar-a-Lago than the middle-class folks he pretended to care for on the campaign trail.”

• “Last week, news broke that Trump had declared a blanket freeze on all federal grants. Ignoring the fact that Congress had already appropriated those funds. Ignoring that he point-blank did not have the authority to do so. Ignoring that his action would—and already has—hurt countless folks who rely on these grants for their most basic needs… He manufactured a crisis that has left that single mom working a double shift in a Southside nursing home unsure whether her Medicaid will be stripped away in the dark of the night. He’s created a crisis that has left Veterans wondering if they’ll be able to access the benefits they earned with the blood they were brave enough to shed for our country. He’s fabricated a nightmarish reality where homeless shelters might have to close their doors and turn back onto the streets the at-risk teenagers who rely on their care.”

• “Elon Musk is unelected, unvetted and unqualified—he does not have the legal authority to dismantle entire agencies. Yet in Trump’s America, the size of his bank account and how far he is willing to bend the knee is enough for our President to bestow on him unchecked power. Musk is willing to bow down to Trump’s throne made of fool’s gold and false promises. So in return, Elon gets to run wild, run rampant. He for some reason gets to have full access to Americans’ social security numbers and Veterans’ personal information—for what reason, no one knows and all of us should fear. He gets to hijack our systems to enrich himself rather than the middle class. He gets to stomp on those in need, then fire anyone who dares stand up for what’s right—or what’s legal…They aren’t making America great. They’re making it authoritarian.”

Duckworth’s opening remarks as prepared below:

I take the verbal baton from Senator King after hours and hours of arguments from my Democratic colleagues, not because I woke up this morning with a strong desire to hear my own voice for as long as I could on the Senate floor, but because decades before I ever considered a career in politics—when I was just starting out in the Army—I raised my right hand and took an oath. I swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. I vowed to protect our nation against all enemies—foreign and domestic.

And in this moment, at this precipice for our country, I need to make good on that promise.

Because in the just 18 days since Donald Trump was inaugurated, we have witnessed an all-out assault on the system of checks and balances that our government was founded upon.

We have seen the President both overreach and underdeliver—proving through executive orders and Twitter marching orders that he cares more about the billionaires who belong to Mar-a-Lago than the middle-class folks he pretended to care for on the campaign trail.

Look, 250 years ago this April, a few brave patriots grabbed their muskets and risked their lives at Lexington and Concord, sacrificing for a country that was still more of an idea, more of an ideal, than reality.

They did so because they could no longer stand living under a tyrannical leader. 

They did so because they had dreamt up the notion of a government of, by and for the people—and they knew that a system based on checks and balances was the best way to keep this new nation’s leaders from turning into the kind of tyrant they’d fled England to escape.  A system of checks and balances.

Well, two weeks into Trump’s America, the only checks I see are the ones going into the pockets of Trump’s rich friends. The only balance I see is Trump’s balancing act between ripping off the middle class and endangering our national security.

Our system of government is being eroded before our eyes. It is being perverted to work for the few—the billionaires—rather than the many, the people.

And it is sickening to see so many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle put their hands over their eyes and pretend they don’t see what’s happening, refusing to speak up as our President turns into more of a despot every day, as his power-grabs get more extreme, more insidious, more cruel. 

Even if we took the full 30 hours of debate on this nomination, I don’t think we could get through all the ways that Trump’s absolute disregard for the rule of law over the past two weeks has already harmed America—and Americans. But let me use my time to try.

Last week, news broke that Trump had declared a blanket freeze on all federal grants. Ignoring the fact that Congress had already appropriated those funds. Ignoring that he point-blank did not have the authority to do so. Ignoring that his action would—and already has—hurt countless folks who rely on these grants for their most basic needs.

President Trump may think that he “owned the Libs” by causing havoc in our federal government. But what he’s really done is create a reality where his own voters who depend on groups like Meals on Wheels aren’t sure how they’re going to put food on the table next week.

He may think he “destroyed woke culture” with this freeze. But no. No, he didn’t. Instead, he manufactured a crisis that has left that single mom working a double shift in a Southside nursing home unsure whether her Medicaid will be stripped away in the dark of the night.

He’s created a crisis that has left Veterans wondering if they’ll be able to access the benefits they earned with the blood they were brave enough to shed for our country.

He’s fabricated a nightmarish reality where homeless shelters might have to close their doors and turn back onto the streets the at-risk teenagers who rely on their care.

Listen, when I was in high school, my family struggled. We had no money and some days had no food. I still remember going to the grocery store and counting out our last five one-dollar food stamps to buy as much bread and bologna as possible—then praying we’d have enough to last the week. I still remember the hours my dad spent walking from payphone to payphone, hoping to find just 50 cents so my brother and I could buy lunch at school the next afternoon. A lot of times, that hot lunch at school was the only meal I could count on.

So as a former hungry kid, and now as a mom of two little girls, I cannot imagine the pain of parents who rely on school meals to feed their own kids and who are now terrified that Trump’s vanity project of a federal freeze will force their five-year-old to go hungry as the grants that fund cafeteria meal programs may now get gutted.

Shame on Donald Trump. And shame on the Republicans who can’t seem to find the ounce of courage necessary to stand up and say what all of us in this Chamber so obviously know: That this is wrong. That this is outrageous. And that this is a wild, unlawful abuse of power.

But Trump didn’t stop with the grant freeze. Last weekend, he gave Elon Musk—the world’s richest person—the power to cut off aid from the world’s most vulnerable people. He gave him the authority to dismantle an entire agency in one illegal, fell swoop. Together, they are now actively gutting USAID, completely undermining the United States’ national security and global standing—knowingly, intentionally—jeopardizing the safety of countless innocent people worldwide who rely on the organization for humanitarian assistance.

Now, bad actors in the PRC and Russia will be able to step in to fill the leadership vacuum that Trump created—forcing folks in need across the world to turn to our adversaries, not us, for help.

Let me be clear: USAID is an organization dedicated to doing good around the globe—but the good that it does also has a direct, tangible impact on the safety and economic security of families here at home.

It is an organization that helps allies detect fentanyl—in part so we can stop it before it comes across our own borders.

It’s an organization that help feeds starving families worldwide—but it does so using 2 billion dollars of food purchased from American farmers, with the paychecks going into their red, white and blue pockets so they can keep their family farms for another generation.

It is an organization that helps stop global pandemics. And it’s an organization that works to make sure the poorest children in the poorest countries don’t die from drinking dirty water—a mission that also happens to be critical to our national strength, as when countries experience water insecurity, they’re more likely to undergo political instability as well, increasing the odds that their governments fail and power falls into the wrong hands—a sequence of events that often leads to the kind of immigration crisis we’re already facing at our border.

I know there is waste, fraud and abuse in our government—and I am all for rooting that out. In fact, I’ve written and passed legislation to do just that.  But eliminating an entire agency with such a vital mission is not the way to go about this.

USAID makes up just 1% of our federal budget. And these short-sighted cuts will end up costing the American taxpayer even more in the long term, as there will be more global instability, more migrations crises, more pandemics to contend with as a result of this frankly idiotic decision.

It’s ironic. The guy charged with making our government more efficient is making it more costly and more chaotic. Case in point: He’s threatening to use American troops to bring home USAID workers if they don’t leave their overseas posts in the next 30 days—a move that in itself would cost Americans an estimated 100 million dollars.

Elon Musk is unelected, unvetted and unqualified—he does not have the legal authority to dismantle entire agencies. Yet in Trump’s America, the size of his bank account and how far he is willing to bend the knee is enough for our President to bestow on him unchecked power.

Musk is willing to bow down to Trump’s throne made of fool’s gold and false promises. So in return, Elon gets to run wild, run rampant.

He for some reason gets to have full access to Americans’ social security numbers and Veterans’ personal information—for what reason, no one knows and all of us should fear.

He gets to hijack our systems to enrich himself rather than the middle class.

He gets to stomp on those in need, then fire anyone who dares stand up for what’s right—or what’s legal.

Trump and Musk are not bringing back the good ole days of Ronald Reagan. Reagan believed in international aid. He is the one whose name is on the front of USAID’s building.

They aren’t making America great. They’re making it authoritarian. And we should all be asking ourselves—if we let them gut USAID, then what’s next?

The answer is the Department of Education. And then your Social Security. Your Medicaid. The things you and your families need to get by are right behind.

Look, Trump ran his campaign on the idea of lowering costs for the middle class. He said he'd reverse inflation on day one. Well, day one has come and gone. So has day two, three, four.

Here we are, weeks in, and all he's done is take actions that have hurt everyday Americans to help his rich buddies afford another private jet. Under his wise stewardship, egg prices have skyrocketed. Inflation remains sky-high. A needless trade war seems to be getting closer every day, which could raise the price of gas and groceries even further. And all of us are in greater danger from bad actors the world-over.

Enough is enough. Enough was enough a very long time ago. Donald Trump is unchecked. The scales of our government have become unbalanced. Every day those scales tip more and more away from serving the needs of the working class and toward feeding the greed of the billionaires who pal around with the President on the golf course.

It was Ronald Reagan who once said, quote: “[T]he genius of our constitutional system is its recognition that no one branch of government alone could be relied on to preserve our freedoms... The great safeguard of our liberty is the totality of the constitutional system, with no one part getting the upper hand.”

Reagan also described the Constitution as a “covenant” — a covenant that, quote: “[W]e have made not only with ourselves, but with all of mankind.”

Today, I am asking my Republican colleagues to honor the covenant so cherished by their own conservative hero, Ronald Reagan. I am asking them to heed his words. To heed his warning. To heed his plea to us all.

Under Donald Trump, our government is not of, by or for the people. It is of, by and for the people with the deepest pockets. “E pluribus unum,” “out of many one,” is supposed to signify the strength of our union—the solidarity of our nation.

Do not let Donald Trump pervert it to mean that out of the many people, he is the only one who matters.

To my colleagues on the other side of the aisle: All I am asking of you today is to do the jobs you were elected to do. 

All I am begging for is that you make good on the oath you took when you were first sworn into this chamber: To support and defend our Constitution.

Trump is acting as if he believes that the Constitution is just an old, yellowing piece of paper that he can crumble up at his will. My colleagues, you know better. And you know your constituents deserve better. 

Please, find the courage to stand up and say so. It’s the least each of us can do for the country that we are lucky enough to have been elected to protect.

You can do that, today, by voting no on Trump’s latest unqualified, unfit cabinet nominee, Russell Vought:

A man who doesn’t even care to hide that he will happily rubber-stamp Trump’s worst instincts. 

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