WASHINGTON, D.C. – Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) spoke on the Senate floor to express her concerns with President Biden's so-called "infrastructure" bill and highlight the boondoggles being marketed to the American people by the administration.

To watch Senator Blackburn’s speech, click below or here.

You can read the transcript recorded in the Congressional Records below or click here.

MRS. BLACKBURN: Madam President, we are less than 100 days into the

Biden administration, and already we can identify a pattern in how they

are building their policy initiatives, interacting with Congress, and

marketing their ideas to the American people. In every example, the

governing rule can be boiled down to ``what you see isn't what you are

going to get.''

  So far, in this 117th Congress, every single major policy proposal

that DC Democrats have forced into the spotlight has been based on a

false premise. They have intentionally misled the American people and

are now catering to the increasingly radical leftwing that gets further

out of step with the rest of this country each and every passing day.

  Consider last month's absurd $1.9 trillion spending package. The

Democrats billed this as ``the American Rescue Plan'' and ``COVID

relief,'' but only 9 percent--9 percent--of the total package pricetag

went for testing, vaccinations, and healthcare jobs. The rest

they used on a massive blue State bailout and blatant redistribution of

wealth.

  It is the same story with this month's $2.25 trillion spending

package. They have done their best to pass this off as an

``infrastructure plan,'' but even if you add up every single line item

that is dedicated to roads, bridges, highways, interstates, ports,

waterways, airports, broadband, and the power grid, only a little over

one-third of that plan will pay for actual infrastructure projects. The

rest--the rest--of that $2.25 trillion is just another slush fund for

union activism, climate change auditors, and Green New Deal fantasies.

  S. 1, the so-called ``voting rights'' bill that my colleagues across

the aisle have spoken so passionately about, completes the trifecta of

bait-and-switch bills, advertised as one thing but that would

accomplish something completely different.

  Now, S. 1 isn't as much a taxpayer-dollar grab as it is a nearly

unprecedented policy power grab that offers solutions in search of

problems. It ignores the promises of federalism. It disregards the

constitutional directive affording States--affording the States--power

over their own elections.

  It requires the use of ballot casting technology and voter

registration systems that don't even exist yet, but I think you can bet

that some politically connected companies will make a whole bunch of

money coming to the market with this technology.

  It would dismantle voter ID laws and prevent local, meaningful

cleanup of voter rolls. Your local election commission wouldn't be able

to purge their rolls of individuals who have died or moved away. We

know that this leads you to a recipe for fraud.

 

  Speaking of fraud, it would force States to allow ballot harvesting.

That is right; it would mandate that they allow ballot harvesting.

Everyone has heard of the perils that exist with ballot harvesting. It

would mandate donor disclosure, opening private citizens up to

harassment and violent attacks. It would upend the mechanics of local

elections for officials and voters alike and cause chaos and confusion

in every precinct in this country.

  So why in the world would Democrats even try to pitch this mess as

something that would protect voting rights? By all accounts, it would

increase the likelihood for fraud and confusion. Well, I think that

they are doing it for the same reason they slapped a ``COVID'' label on

a $1.9 trillion wish list and an ``infrastructure'' label on a $2.25

trillion wish list. They know that if the American people caught on to

all that they are doing, they would never win another election.

  Now, think about that--if you know your policies are so unpopular

with the American people that you have to cloak them behind different

words, different phrases, words that the meaning of the word is

evolving because they don't stand up to scrutiny in the light of day.

And that is what is happening.

  You know, it isn't just false advertising. It is not a falsehood. It

is not misrepresentation. It is not an inaccuracy. It is not an

accidental lie. This is an intentional lie. They are perpetrating this

lie on behalf of a radical leftist minority of Americans whose ideas

are so destructive that they wouldn't withstand 10 minutes of good,

solid, robust, respectful bipartisan debate on this Senate floor.

  Nothing about S. 1 will serve the best interests of the American

people, and my Republican colleagues and I aren't the only ones who see

the problems with it. Tennesseeans are worried about this, too,

because, in Tennessee, we did the work to clean up our voter rolls and

implement fair voter ID laws. We cut down on fraud and increased faith

in the electoral process.

  This is how it is supposed to work. We do not need Federal

intervention to protect the vote. So no wonder my Democratic colleagues

chose to use the full weight of the Senate Judiciary Committee to scare

the American people into believing they live in ``Jim Crow America.''

Throughout the course of last week's hearing, which they called ``Jim

Crow 2021: The Latest Assault on the Right to Vote,'' they weaponized

the pernicious lens of critical race theory against Georgia legislators

and the thousands of election officials and volunteers who work year-

round to bring as many eligible voters to the polls as possible.

  Everyone should exercise their right to vote. We should protect one

person, one vote. We should encourage people in our local communities

to cast their ballot. But my friends across the aisle, they are

desperate, and they are desperate to distract from what S. 1 would

actually do, so desperate to distract from what it would actually do

that they are willing to project the evil hatred behind slavery,

segregation, and race-based violence, projecting that onto people whose

only goal is to protect the vote from criminals who would seek to

defraud it and make certain that individuals are registered to vote,

that they vote, and that legal votes are counted and those improperly

cast are not.

  Now, my friends across the aisle have an invalid premise, and they

should all pause and question their motives. The American people should

be worried about what is happening in this Chamber when no one is

looking. They should feel outrage at an administration that

deliberately tries to manipulate them into supporting destructive,

wasteful, and dangerous legislation.

  I think these bait-and-switch tactics are going to backfire. I think

the scare tactics are going to backfire because instead of being scared

into submission, which is the agenda of the left, the American people

are going to be scared into action.

  Based on the contents of H.R. 1 and S. 1, I guess that they are more

familiar with the ins and outs of their neighborhood polling places

than DC Democrats could ever expect to be. And that doesn't bode well

for the administration or the current congressional majority

  I yield the floor.

  I suggest the absence of a quorum.