WASHINGTON, Nov. 7 – Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) today delivered remarks on the floor of the Senate regarding the government shutdown.

Sanders’ remarks, as prepared for delivery, are below and can be watched HERE:

M. President: We are now in the 38th day of a government shutdown. That means that federal employees all over this country who have to feed their families are not getting paychecks. It means that air traffic controllers are forced to work crazy hours, and we worry about the safety of our flights right now. We worry about Capitol Police officers right here in D.C. who are having a hard time feeding their families.

These are hardworking people who are doing important work. They deserve respect. They deserve to be paid. This shutdown must end as quickly as possible.

And on top of the fact that we have hundreds of thousands of workers not getting paid, we now have a president who — for the first time in the history of this country — is willing to allow our kids, low-income, working-class children, to go hungry in order to try to make a political point. A point, by the way, that the American people are seeing through.

M. President: The cause of the shutdown is not complicated. For the first time ever, the majority party in the Senate, which needs 60 votes to pass a budget, is refusing to negotiate. It is their way or the highway. “Take it or leave it. We got the majority. We’re not talking to you.” Despite the fact that they only have 53 votes. And that is unacceptable.

And to make the situation even more absurd, and to show the American people the contempt in which the Republicans hold for negotiations and democracy, you’ve got a Speaker of the House who has now given his members a six-week paid vacation.

The country is in the midst of a major crisis. Republican members of the House are nowhere to be seen. They’re on a paid vacation. And if that doesn’t tell you everything you need to know about whether Republicans are willing to negotiate, I don’t know what will.

M. Speaker: Everyone in America knows that our current health care system is broken. They know that we pay — by far, not even close — the highest prices in the world for health care, while some 85 million Americans are uninsured or underinsured. They know we are the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people as a human right — something that must change.

And what they also know is that Donald Trump and the Republicans, through their horrendous “Big, Beautiful Bill,” are making a broken health care system even worse, taking it to the verge of collapse. That legislation is doubling premiums for over 20 million Americans who are in the Affordable Care Act exchange.

And in my state, we are hearing from Vermonters who are being asked to pay a tripling and even a quadrupling of their rates.

Who in God’s name, at a time when health care costs are already so high, can afford a doubling, a tripling, a quadrupling of their rates?

That is insane. Nobody in my state, or I expect, in this country, can afford to pay that.

Further, that “Big, Beautiful Bill” would throw 15 million people off the health care they now have as a result of massive cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act. According to studies, that would result in some 50,000 Americans dying unnecessarily every year — low income, working class people who have chronic illnesses, who will no longer be able to get health care. That is what is being discussed. Anybody think that’s a good idea? To allow 50,000 of our fellow Americans to die unnecessarily each year?

And all of this was done in order to give $1 trillion in tax breaks to the 1%. No, M. President, I do not believe that Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and the other multibillionaires deserve a trillion dollars in tax breaks in order to throw 15 million Americans off the health care they have and double premiums for over 20 million Americans. I don’t believe that, and the overwhelming majority of Republicans, Democrats, independents don’t believe that, either.

M. President: The American people understand that the Republican Party controls the White House, the Senate and the House of Representatives. And, understandably, for that reason, poll after poll shows that Americans hold the Republicans accountable for this shutdown.

But it’s not just polls. On Tuesday, there was an election in which Trumpism was overwhelmingly rejected from Maine to California — and a lot of states and cities in between. And one of the key reasons is that Americans want Democrats to make certain that they do not experience huge increases in their health care premiums or get thrown off the health care they have.

That is what they are saying: “We cannot afford a doubling or a tripling in our health care costs. Stand with us.” That’s what that election was significantly about.

President Trump claims to be a dealmaker. In fact, he wrote a book called “The Art of the Deal.” 

Well, Mr. President, the ball is in your court right now. Show us what a great dealmaker you are. Help us negotiate a deal which protects the health care of tens of millions of Americans and let us end this shutdown today. We can end it in the next few hours.

So, M. President: that is what this struggle is about. That’s what this shutdown is all about. It’s whether Republicans succeed in making a broken and dysfunctional health care system even worse by making health care unaffordable for working class and middle class Americans. It’s about whether millions of our fellow Americans no longer have health insurance, and that many of them die unnecessarily.

M. President: We are hearing tragic stories right now — every one of our offices — of tragic stories of families having to decide whether they can pay for their parent’s cancer treatment, for example, or whether they will see a parent die without that lifesaving care.

There are millions of Americans dealing with chronic disease. They’re dealing with cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s and heart disease. And they are wondering, if they get thrown off the health care, premiums go so high, how are they going to stay alive? How are they going to take care of their parents, their kids?

That is what this shutdown is about.

And whether it is in Maine, New Hampshire, Nevada or Vermont, the American people want us to stand with them. And that is what this whole debate is about.

We cannot fail the American people. They are looking to us to make sure that they continue to have health care. Let us not betray them.